404 page crashes in development mode

[dewanshDT]

Details about the bug:

the 404 page always crashes in development mode making it annoying for the developer to work with the application.

• p5.js version: any
• Web browser and version: MS Edge
• Operating System: windows
• Steps to reproduce this: just refresh in a non-existing route, or it sometimes happens automatically

[lindapaiste]

I personally have not experienced this. It may have to do with the server/database not being set up on your end. There are a few issues and PRs regarding whether it's possible to develop the frontend without having to setup mongodb:

• [dev-task] Separate Webpack Dev server from API server #1348
• feat: configure webpack-dev-server for independent frontend development #1999
• Separate Webpack Dev server from API server (fixes #1348) #1415
• [Experimental] Standalone Frontend Dev Server #1257

I also think it's weird that the 404 page is rendered on the server and I opened an issue about that:

• Discussion: Why is the 404 page rendered by the server? #2159

This is what I see:

It doesn't crash, but I also don't get a random sketch displayed like it's supposed to. Looking at the code, that must mean that I'm in the else branch on line 143. Which I guess means that User.findOne({ username: 'p5' } did not find a user for me? Definitely worth digging into more to see what's actually going on.

edit: It seems like in my database I have no p5 user and in your database you have a p5 user with 0 sketches.

[dewanshDT]

yeah, I don't have anything in my MongoDB database, It's running locally, and connected tho. that's why it's crashing due to 0 sketches. In this PR I just added default values to the arguments which prevented it from crashing even without any sketches. what do you think should I close It? @lindapaiste

[lindapaiste]

Not sure. You've made me realize that I'm missing the p5 examples in my local db so now I'm re-reading the docs on setting up the development environment. I think neither of us did step 10 properly.

[dewanshDT]

Ohh thanks! I've never thought that before
edit: it still crashes after that though 🤔

[raclim]

Hey, thanks for all of your thoughts on this! After thinking about it, I don't think this specific issue is something we'll focus on for now, since as mentioned earlier, I feel that this might be tied to some mishaps in setting up the dev environment. Maybe some updates to the installation documentation might need to be made, but I think this might be something to revisit later in the future!