How do you return status 401 from WebAPI to AngularJS and also include a custom message?

Question

In my WebAPI class, an ApiController, I make a call such as:

string myCustomMessage = .....;

throw new HttpResponseException(
    new HttpResponseMessage(HttpStatusCode.Unauthorized)
        { ReasonPhrase = myCustomMessage });

When I call using AngularJS $resource service, I do get 401 in the status field the response, in the catch block of the promise. The 401 matches HttpStatusCode.Unauthorized, so all's well.

The problem, however, is that the data field of the response is empty (null). I don't get the myCustomMessage returned.

Now, if rather than throwing a HttpResponseException exception, I just throw a regular Exception with a message, that message does make it sway back to Angular.

I need to be able to do both: return a custom message from the server, as well as have the returned status code be whatever I want, in this case 401.

Anyone know how to make that work?

[edit] Solution:

 throw new HttpResponseException(
     Request.CreateErrorResponse(HttpStatusCode.Unauthorized, myCustomMessage));

Answer 1

Try returning HttpResponseMessage like this.

public HttpResponseMessage Get()
{
    return Request.CreateErrorResponse(
              HttpStatusCode.Unauthorized, "You are not authorized");
}

This should produce an HTTP response message like this.

HTTP/1.1 401 Unauthorized
Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
Server: Microsoft-IIS/8.0
Date: Sat, 12 Apr 2014 07:12:54 GMT
Content-Length: 36

{"Message":"You are not authorized"}