Returning Warnings instead of Errors from Breeze Web API

Question

I use Breeze.js and C# WebAPI with BreezeController. I want to update an entity on the client web page, pass it to the WebAPI for update, save the entity, and send back a warning(s).

[HttpPost]
public SaveResult SaveChanges(JObject saveBundle) {}

Is there a way to return SaveResult with information about a warning? Not an error, a warning.

Example, I'm saving the age of a resident. If the age is < than 50 [that is not an error] I still want to warn the user that this may be an incorrect age for a resident based on my business rules.

saveResult.Errors.Add(new EntityError() {
                        PropertyName = "Age",
                        ErrorName = "Warning",
                        ErrorMessage = "The age of the resident is less than 50.  You may want to verify that you entered the correct age."
                    });

If I do this (This is the behavior I want):

The entity is correctly saved.
The Warning message is sent back in the saveResult structure.
The entity is correctly updated on the server and sent back with the saveResult (i.e. system generated primary key of my entity contains a new ID).

However (This is NOT the behavior I want):

On the client, the Entity is not updated. i.e the PK is not updated and the Entity is still in a pending state (not saved).

I'm sure that the fact that I return an error in the SaveResult is the problem since Breeze.js is probably interpreting this (correctly) as an error. However, I don't see how to return the warning using the Breeze model and still have everything functional.

By the way, I know I could be doing that validation on the client side before calling the WebAPI but I want all my validations to be server side, especially since some of these validations are quite complex.

Any suggestions?

Jay Traband Jay Traband · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-23T21:03:52

Right now breeze doesn't have a concept of 'warnings' as opposed to 'errors' but I do agree that the concept is useful. Can you add this as a feature request on the breeze User Voice, (http://breezejs.uservoice.com/) and if it gets enough interest we would certainly look into it?

Returning Warnings instead of Errors from Breeze Web API

1 Answers