Laravel throw ValidationException but not hitting destroy method's catch block? - php

Question

I am trying to return a custom exception message using Laravel's ValidationException class. I have it successfully working in the following example:
public function store(Request $request)
{
$this->validate($request, CurrencyValidatorArrays::$store);
try {
$this->currenciesInstance->createOrUpdateCurrency($request->all());
return redirect()->route('currencies.index')
->with('success', 'Successfully created currency');
} catch (Exception $e) {
return redirect()->route('currencies.create')
->with('error', $e->getMessage());
}
}
where the exception is thrown from within createOrUpdateCurrency()
if(Currency::where('position', $data['position'])->where('id', '!=', $id)->exists()) {
throw ValidationException::withMessages([
'error' => ['Position value is already taken']
]);
}
This then passes the exception message back to my view for display.
However, I am trying to implement this somewhere else when trying to delete a company I am checking that no users exist first:
public function destroy($id)
{
try {
$this->companiesInstance->deleteCompany($id);
return redirect()->route('companies.index')
->with('success', 'Successfully deleted company');
} catch (Exception $e) {
return redirect()->route('companies.index')
->with('error', $e->getMessage());
}
}
Inside of deleteCompany():
$company = Company::find($id);
if($company->users()->exists()){
throw ValidationException::withMessages([
'error' => ['Position value is already taken']
]);
}
For some reason this doesn't hit my catch block from the main destroy method,if I change the exception type to ValidationException from Exception I can access and see the exception object but not in the way I can in the Store() methods version. Any ideas what is going on here?
UPDATE:
So I have a some what of a workaround:
To get by the exception type issue I used:
catch (ValidationException | Exception $e) { ...
But that still does not help when accessing the exception messages as when it's of type ValidationException the default constructor validation message is returned from getMessage() and not my specified one.

Answer 1

PHP 7 handles exceptions a bit differently. You can read it here.
Coming back to your code, you have to try and catch object of Throwable instead of Exception.
try
{
// Code that may throw an Exception or Error.
}
catch (Throwable $t)
{
// Code that handles the error
}
Hope this helps.