Exception handling in the Python SDK

Find and fix errors quickly for the best customer experience

The Expedia Group platform SDK for Python uses exceptions to relay errors. At the root of the exception hierarchy is ExpediaGroupException, from which all other exceptions are extended. ExpediaGroupException is never thrown directly.

There are two categories of an ExpediaGroupException:

1. ExpediaGroupApiException: thrown when the downstream service returns an error response; that is, the service successfully received the request, but it was not able to process it. The exception object provides the caller with several pieces of information about the error, including an HTTP status code and a detailed message. ExpediaGroupAuthException is a subtype of this exception, and it is thrown when authentication fails.

2. ExpediaGroupClientException: thrown at client errors, either when trying to send the request or parse the response. For example, an ExpediaGroupConfigurationException is thrown if credentials are not configured.

Since exceptions are unchecked, the caller decided which exceptions to handle. In principle, an ExpediaGroupClientException is assumed to be not retryable, and they should be typically fixed during development. An ExpediGroupApiException, on the other hand, might be recoverable, such as errors resulting from a service being temporarily unavailable. Error handling should therefore focus on the latter.