redpanda-data / redpanda-data/benthos

Error handling in the `retry` processor

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needs investigation processors
Dominant language
Go
Stars
571
Forks
120
Avg merge
2d 1h
Merged PRs (30d)
18

Description

Currently, the retry processor scrubs the error of the origin message. This can be confusing for users. Maybe it would be better to not scrub it at all and make sure it's set back to its original value if one of the child processors clears it? Or maybe it's best to scrub it and set it back if the child processors don't set some other error? Or append to it the error coming from child processors? Not sure what's the best tradeoff...

Here's a sample config to experiment with:

input:
  generate:
    count: 1
    mapping: root = ""
  processors:
    - mapping: root = throw("kaboom")

  processors:
    - log:
        message: 'Before: ${! error() }'

    - retry:
        processors:
          - log:
              message: 'Inside: ${! error() }'

    - log:
        message: 'After: ${! error() }'

output:
  drop: {}

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start with internal/impl/pure/processor_retry.go around the cited error scrubbing and run the sample YAML configuration to observe the error before, inside, and after retry. Decide the intended error-preservation tradeoff with maintainers, then add regression coverage for the agreed behavior; done means the retry processor's error semantics are explicit and verified.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
go
Domain
stream-processing
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
5/5
Estimated time
Over a week
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Needs clarification
Newbie friendliness
25/100

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