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Handling Exceptions

A best practice when programming is to write code that assumes and anticipates that things will go wrong. For example, a client may not be connected to the internet when trying to connect to a session.

The OpenTok.js library includes completion handlers and exception events that reveal exceptions at run time.

This topic includes the following sections:

Completion handlers

For many methods that complete asynchronously, the final parameter you pass in is a completion handler function. This function is called when the method completes or fails. If it fails, the function is passed an error object as a parameter.

For example, the following code calls the Session.connect() method, passing in a completion handler:

var session = OT.initSession(apiKey, session);
session.connect(token, function (error) {
  if (error) {
    console.log("Failed to connect: ", error.message);
    if (error.name === "OT_NOT_CONNECTED") {
      alert("You are not connected to the internet. Check your network connection.");
    }
  } else {
    console.log("Connected");
  }
});

It is important to implement completion handlers to see when a method succeeds or fails. In some cases, you can prompt the user if there is a client condition that caused the error. For example, if the error.name property is set to "OT_NOT_CONNECTED" when calling the Session.connect() method fails, this indicates that the client is not connected to the network.

For other error conditions that are not the fault of the client, you can examine the error code and message to see the nature of the error. For example, when calling the Session.connect() method fails, an error code of 1004 indicates that you tried to connect with an invalid token. This could be a token that is expired or that does not match the session you are connecting to. Check the message property of the error object for details.

Methods with completion handlers

The following methods in the OpenTok JavaScript SDK include a completionHandler parameter. For this optional parameter, you can pass in a function that is called when the method succeeds or fails:

Check the message property for more details about the error.

In the event of an error, the code value of the error parameter can have one of the following values:

Errors when calling Session.connect():
code Description
1004 Authentication error. Check the error message for details. This error can result if you pass in an expired token when trying to connect to a session. It can also occur if you pass in an invalid token or API key. Make sure that you are generating the token using the current version of one of the OpenTok server SDKs.
1005 Invalid Session ID. Make sure you generate the session ID using the current version of one of the OpenTok server SDKs.
1006 Connect Failed. Unable to connect to the session. You may want to have the client check the network connection.
Errors when calling Session.forceDisconnect():
code Description
1520 Unable to force disconnect. The client's token does not have the role set to moderator. Once the client has connected to the session, the capabilities property of the Session object lists the client's capabilities.
Errors when calling Session.forceUnpublish():
code Description
1530 Unable to force unpublish. The client's token does not have the role set to moderator. Once the client has connected to the session, the capabilities property of the Session object lists the client's capabilities.
1535 Force Unpublish on an invalid stream. Make sure that the stream has not left the session before you call the forceUnpublish() method.
Errors when calling Session.publish():
code Description
1010 Cannot publish: the client is not connected to the OpenTok session. Check that your application makes the client connect successfully before trying to publish. And check that the client has not disconnected before trying to publish.
1500 Unable to Publish. The client's token does not have the role set to publish or moderator. Once the client has connected to the session, the capabilities property of the Session object lists the client's capabilities.
1601 Internal error -- WebRTC publisher error. Try republishing or reconnecting to the session.
Errors when calling Session.signal():
code Description
1510 Unable to signal. Check that the to property of the signal parameter is set to a valid Connection object. Also, make sure that you are connected to the session.
Errors when calling Session.subscribe():
code Description
1600 Internal error -- WebRTC subscriber error. Try resubscribing to the stream or reconnecting to the session.
Errors when calling OT.initPublisher():
code Description
1004 Authentication error. Check the error message for details. This error can result if you pass in an expired token when trying to connect to a session. It can also occur if you pass in an invalid token or API key. Make sure that you are generating the token using the current version of one of the OpenTok server SDKs.
General errors that can occur when calling any method:
code Description
1011 Invalid Parameter. Check that you have passed valid parameter values into the method call.
2000 Internal Error. Try reconnecting to the OpenTok session and trying the action again.

Listening for exception events

To detect all exception events, add an event listener for the exception event, dispatched by the OT object. However, it is easier to react to errors in completion handlers for specific methods.