Ruby 2.5 adds Exception#full_message method

Before Ruby 2.5, if we want to log a caught exception, we would need to format it ourselves.

class AverageService
  attr_reader :numbers, :coerced_numbers

  def initialize(numbers)
    @numbers = numbers
    @coerced_numbers = coerce_numbers
  end

  def average
    sum / count
  end

  private

  def coerce_numbers
    numbers.map do |number|
      begin
        Float(number)
      rescue Exception => exception
        puts "#{exception.message} (#{exception.class})\n\t#{exception.backtrace.join("\n\t")}"
        puts "Coercing '#{number}' as 0.0\n\n"

        0.0
      end
    end
  end

  def sum
    coerced_numbers.map(&:to_f).sum
  end

  def count
    coerced_numbers.size.to_f
  end
end

average = AverageService.new(ARGV).average
puts "Average is: #{average}"

$ RBENV_VERSION=2.4.0 ruby average_service.rb 5 4f 7 1s0
invalid value for Float(): "4f" (ArgumentError)
	average_service.rb:18:in `Float'
	average_service.rb:18:in `block in coerce_numbers'
	average_service.rb:16:in `map'
	average_service.rb:16:in `coerce_numbers'
	average_service.rb:6:in `initialize'
	average_service.rb:37:in `new'
	average_service.rb:37:in `<main>'

Coercing '4f' as 0.0

invalid value for Float(): "1s0" (ArgumentError)
	average_service.rb:18:in `Float'
	average_service.rb:18:in `block in coerce_numbers'
	average_service.rb:16:in `map'
	average_service.rb:16:in `coerce_numbers'
	average_service.rb:6:in `initialize'
	average_service.rb:37:in `new'
	average_service.rb:37:in `<main>'

Coercing '1s0' as 0.0

Average of [5.0, 0.0, 7.0, 0.0] is: 3.0

It was proposed that there should be a simple method to print the caught exception using the same format that ruby uses while printing an uncaught exception.

Some of the proposed method names were display, formatted, to_formatted_s, long_message, and full_message.

Matz approved the Exception#full_message method name.

In Ruby 2.5, we can re-write above example as follows.

class AverageService
  attr_reader :numbers, :coerced_numbers

  def initialize(numbers)
    @numbers = numbers
    @coerced_numbers = coerce_numbers
  end

  def average
    sum / count
  end

  private

  def coerce_numbers
    numbers.map do |number|
      begin
        Float(number)
      rescue Exception => exception
        puts exception.full_message
        puts "Coercing '#{number}' as 0.0\n\n"

        0.0
      end
    end
  end

  def sum
    coerced_numbers.map(&:to_f).sum
  end

  def count
    coerced_numbers.size.to_f
  end
end

average = AverageService.new(ARGV).average
puts "Average is: #{average}"

$ RBENV_VERSION=2.5.0 ruby average_service.rb 5 4f 7 1s0
Traceback (most recent call last):
	6: from average_service.rb:37:in `<main>'
	5: from average_service.rb:37:in `new'
	4: from average_service.rb:6:in `initialize'
	3: from average_service.rb:16:in `coerce_numbers'
	2: from average_service.rb:16:in `map'
	1: from average_service.rb:18:in `block in coerce_numbers'
average_service.rb:18:in `Float': invalid value for Float(): "4f" (ArgumentError)

Coercing '4f' as 0.0

Traceback (most recent call last):
	6: from average_service.rb:37:in `<main>'
	5: from average_service.rb:37:in `new'
	4: from average_service.rb:6:in `initialize'
	3: from average_service.rb:16:in `coerce_numbers'
	2: from average_service.rb:16:in `map'
	1: from average_service.rb:18:in `block in coerce_numbers'
average_service.rb:18:in `Float': invalid value for Float(): "1s0" (ArgumentError)

Coercing '1s0' as 0.0

Average of [5.0, 0.0, 7.0, 0.0] is: 3.0

Note that, Ruby 2.5 prints exception backtrace in reverse order if STDERR is unchanged and is a TTY as discussed in our previous blog post.