Cannot catch error while parsing some RSS feed

[lamarios]

I have a feed that fails to be parsed in some occasion. The issue is that it looks like that error is caught internally by the library and I can't catch it to indicate an error to my users.

It would be good if there was a way to catch it.

2025-12-22T07:48:42.086Z  WARN 245081 --- [pool-3-thread-1] com.apptasticsoftware.rssreader          : Failed to parse XML from feed https://nofrag.com/feed/

com.ctc.wstx.exc.WstxParsingException: Unexpected close tag </content:encoded>; expected </description>.
 at [row,col {unknown-source}]: [48,23]
	at com.ctc.wstx.sr.StreamScanner.constructWfcException(StreamScanner.java:634) ~[woodstox-core-7.0.0.jar:7.0.0]
	at com.ctc.wstx.sr.StreamScanner.throwParseError(StreamScanner.java:504) ~[woodstox-core-7.0.0.jar:7.0.0]
	at com.ctc.wstx.sr.StreamScanner.throwParseError(StreamScanner.java:488) ~[woodstox-core-7.0.0.jar:7.0.0]
	at com.ctc.wstx.sr.BasicStreamReader.reportWrongEndElem(BasicStreamReader.java:3373) ~[woodstox-core-7.0.0.jar:7.0.0]
	at com.ctc.wstx.sr.BasicStreamReader.readEndElem(BasicStreamReader.java:3300) ~[woodstox-core-7.0.0.jar:7.0.0]
	at com.ctc.wstx.sr.BasicStreamReader.nextFromTree(BasicStreamReader.java:2920) ~[woodstox-core-7.0.0.jar:7.0.0]
	at com.ctc.wstx.sr.BasicStreamReader.next(BasicStreamReader.java:1122) ~[woodstox-core-7.0.0.jar:7.0.0]
	at com.apptasticsoftware.rssreader.AbstractRssReader$RssItemIterator.next(AbstractRssReader.java:724) ~[rssreader-3.12.0.jar:3.12.0]
	at com.apptasticsoftware.rssreader.AbstractRssReader$RssItemIterator.peekNext(AbstractRssReader.java:700) ~[rssreader-3.12.0.jar:3.12.0]
	at com.apptasticsoftware.rssreader.AbstractRssReader$RssItemIterator.hasNext(AbstractRssReader.java:709) ~[rssreader-3.12.0.jar:3.12.0]
	at java.base/java.util.Iterator.forEachRemaining(Iterator.java:132) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.Spliterators$IteratorSpliterator.forEachRemaining(Spliterators.java:1939) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.stream.AbstractPipeline.copyInto(AbstractPipeline.java:570) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.stream.AbstractPipeline.wrapAndCopyInto(AbstractPipeline.java:560) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.stream.AbstractPipeline.evaluate(AbstractPipeline.java:635) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.stream.AbstractPipeline.evaluateToArrayNode(AbstractPipeline.java:291) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.stream.ReferencePipeline.toArray(ReferencePipeline.java:652) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.stream.ReferencePipeline.toArray(ReferencePipeline.java:658) ~[na:na]
	at com.apptasticsoftware.rssreader.internal.stream.AbstractAutoCloseStream.autoClose(AbstractAutoCloseStream.java:54) ~[rssreader-3.12.0.jar:3.12.0]
	at com.apptasticsoftware.rssreader.internal.stream.AutoCloseStream.toArray(AutoCloseStream.java:150) ~[rssreader-3.12.0.jar:3.12.0]
	at java.base/java.util.stream.Stream.toList(Stream.java:1249) ~[na:na]
	at com.github.lamarios.newsku.services.FeedItemService.refreshFeedWorker(FeedItemService.java:79) ~[classes/:na]
	at com.github.lamarios.newsku.services.FeedItemService.lambda$refreshFeed$0(FeedItemService.java:67) ~[classes/:na]
	at java.base/java.util.concurrent.Executors$RunnableAdapter.call(Executors.java:545) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run$$$capture(FutureTask.java:328) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run(FutureTask.java) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:1090) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:614) ~[na:na]
	at java.base/java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:1474) ~[na:na]

[w3stling]

Thanks for reporting this!

Are you using the InvalidXmlCharacterFilter? If so, the issue you’re seeing is a bug in that class—it can corrupt the rest of the feed when parsing CDATA.

PR #315 fixes this problem, and the fix will be included in the next release. In the meantime, you can:

1. Use a copy of the fixed InvalidXmlCharacterFilter from master.
2. Avoid using InvalidXmlCharacterFilter until the next release.

We’ll also be looking into improving the error handling.

[lamarios]

Ok thanks. Will use the copy from master for the time being.

By the way is there way to just get the channel details when parsing a feed ? Right now I don't really know how to get the data if the feed has no items.

[w3stling]

No, that’s not currently possible.