Error Handling Guide

1. Overview

This guide establishes the framework for error management at Aevum News. It covers both editorial/content errors (fact-check failures, broken media, CMS validation issues) and technical platform errors (API failures, CDN outages, database timeouts, frontend rendering faults).

All errors must be logged in the central incident tracker. Critical and high-severity errors trigger automatic Slack alerts and require post-mortem documentation within 48 hours of resolution.

2. Error Classification Matrix

Errors are categorized by severity, impact, and required response time. Use this matrix to prioritize triage efforts.

Custom error codes follow the pattern ERR-XXX where XXX indicates the subsystem. Always include the full stack trace or CMS audit log reference when reporting.

3. Editorial & Content Errors

Content integrity is paramount. The editorial pipeline includes automated validation and human review gates.

3.1 Fact-Check & Source Validation

• All claims must cite verified sources. Missing citations trigger ERR-204 during pre-publish validation.
• AI-assisted drafting must be flagged in the metadata. Human verification is mandatory before publication.
• Correction logs are immutable. Edits to published articles append a timestamped changelog entry.

3.2 Media & Asset Errors

4. Technical Platform Errors

Infrastructure and API-layer errors require immediate engineering intervention. Use the following reference for common failures.

4.1 API Gateway Failures

const handleApiError = async (error) => {
  if (error.status === 503) {
    logger.warn("Backend overload - enabling circuit breaker");
    return fallbackToCachedContent();
  }
  if (error.status >= 500) {
    alertIncidentChannel("ERR-5XX", error.stack);
  }
};

4.2 Frontend Rendering & Hydration Errors

Client-side errors are captured via Sentry. Prioritize fixes that affect Core Web Vitals or article readability. Use the browser console to isolate framework-specific hydration mismatches.

5. Incident Response Workflow

1. Detect: Automated monitoring, reader reports, or editorial flags trigger an incident ticket.
2. Triage: Assign severity using the classification matrix. Route to Engineering or Editorial Ops.
3. Contain: Apply hotfixes, enable fallbacks, or temporarily restrict affected features.
4. Resolve: Deploy permanent fix. Verify via staging environment.
5. Post-Mortem: Document root cause, timeline, and preventive measures. Share with all teams within 48h.

6. Prevention & Monitoring

Proactive measures reduce error frequency and improve platform resilience.

• Automated Linting: Content must pass schema validation before draft submission.
• Health Checks: Endpoints ping every 30s. Three consecutive failures trigger auto-remediation.
• Canary Deploys: New CMS versions roll out to 5% of traffic before full release.
• Reader Feedback Loop: "Report Issue" button on articles feeds directly into the ticketing system with context pre-filled.

7. Error Reporting Template

Use this structure when submitting bugs or editorial errors:

## Title: [Brief description]
## Type: Editorial / Technical / Infrastructure
## Severity: Critical / High / Medium / Low
## Steps to Reproduce:
1. 
2. 
3. 
## Expected Behavior:
## Actual Behavior:
## Environment: (CMS version, Browser, API endpoint)
## Screenshots/Logs: 
## Assigned To: 

8. Frequently Asked Questions