Error handling anti-patterns rules Claude-Mem codebase.

Source: Dev.to

Process

1. Run the detector

   # command to run the detector (example)

2. Analyze the results

   • Count CRITICAL, HIGH, MEDIUM, and APPROVED_OVERRIDE issues
   • Prioritize CRITICAL issues on critical paths first
   • Group similar patterns together

3. For each CRITICAL issue

   a. Read the problematic code using the Read tool

   b. Explain the problem

   • Why is this dangerous?
   • What debugging nightmare could this cause?
   • What specific error is being swallowed?

   c. Determine the right fix

   • Option 1: Add proper logging – if this is a real error that should be visible
   • Option 2: Add [APPROVED OVERRIDE] – if this is expected/documented behavior
   • Option 3: Remove the try‑catch entirely – if the error should propagate
   • Option 4: Add specific error type checking – if only certain errors should be caught

   d. Propose the fix and ask for approval

   e. Apply the fix after approval

4. Work through issues methodically

   • Fix one at a time
   • Re‑run the detector after each batch of fixes
   • Track progress, e.g., “Fixed 3/28 critical issues”

Detect‑error‑handling‑antipatterns script

The script detect-error-handling-antipatterns.ts (≈ 514 LOC) defines several functions for locating anti‑patterns.
In the detectAntiPatterns function, regular expressions are used to spot problematic error handling, for example:

// Example regex patterns
/,\\s(?:error|err|e).message\\s*)/,
{\\s(?:error|err|e):\\s*(?:error|err|e).message\\s*}/,
][^'"]+['"`]\\s*,\\s*(?:error|err|e).message\\s*)/

These patterns are applied like so:

for (const pattern of partialErrorLoggingPatterns) {
  if (pattern.test(trimmed)) {
    if (hasOverride && overrideReason) {
      antiPatterns.push({
        file: relPath,
        line: i + 1,
        // …
      });
    }
  }
}

Another set of patterns:

'"`['"]\\s*\\)/i,
](\\w+)['"]\\s*\\)/i,
](\\w+)['"`]\\s*)/i,

Regex vs. AST

Using an Abstract Syntax Tree (AST) could provide more reliable detection than regex, especially for complex JavaScript code. See the discussion on AST on Stack Overflow.

References