How to accept a SoapException on the client side

Question

I was getting the dreaded "client found response content type of "text/html" but expected "test/xml" error, but after some googling I found this post about how to return a SoapException.

So I went ahead and implemented that, but now I'm still getting the same error. Are there changes that I need to make on the client-side to be able to accept the SoapException (I wouldn't think so, everything just inherits from Exception, right?)

Why am I still getting that dreaded response on the client side?

    [WebMethod]
    [SoapHeader("authenticationHeader")]
    [WebServiceAuthentication(AuthenticationRequired = false)]
    public DataSet GetConversionErrors()
    {
        try
        {
            return Components.PWD.GetConversionErrors();
        }
        catch (Exception ex)
        {
            PublishingManager.Publish(ex, HttpContext.Current.User.Identity.Name);
            throw Components.SoapException.GenerateSoapException(ex, Context);
        }
    }

Edit: I know that the exception in this catch block is exactly what I need to see, but I'm still getting the System.InvalidOperationException on the client-side.

Edit2: I'm connecting to the webservices via a WebReference (calling a *.asmx file) if that helps/matters.

Edit3: Here's what's getting written to our exceptionlog server-side (in the PublishingManager.Publish() call). My thought was that this should be what is returned to the client...

Exception Details:
Exception Type: System.Exception
Message: Test the text/html text/xml message. 
Method: PWD.Components.PWD.GetConversionErrors 
Username: xxxxxx Created 5/22/2012 4:20:53 PM 
Application: xxxx Application Identity: NT AUTHORITY\IUSR 
Source: xxxx Severity 2 
Machine: xxxxxxxxx IP Address 127.0.0.1 
AppDomain /LM/W3SVC/1/ROOT-1-129821937733610609 
Stack Trace    at PWD.Components.PWD.GetConversionErrors() in C:\Vault\Development-New\Web\Main_Logging\PWD\Components\PWD.cs:line 73 
   at PWD.PWD.GetConversionErrors() in C:\Vault\Development-New\Web\Main_Logging\PWD\PWD.asmx.cs:line 44 
Additional Information:
  +System.Exception: 
    Message: Test the text/html text/xml message. 
    Data: System.Collections.ListDictionaryInternal 
    InnerException:  
    TargetSite: System.Data.DataSet GetConversionErrors() 
    StackTrace:    at PWD.Components.PWD.GetConversionErrors() in C:\Vault\Development-New\Web\Main_Logging\PWD\Components\PWD.cs:line 73 
   at PWD.PWD.GetConversionErrors() in C:\Vault\Development-New\Web\Main_Logging\PWD\PWD.asmx.cs:line 44 
    HelpLink:  
    Source: xxxx 
     UserName: xxxxxxx 
     TypeName: PublishingManager 
     MachineName: xxxxxxxxx 
     TimeStamp: 5/22/2012 4:20:54 PM 
     FullName: Services.Publishing, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null 
     AppDomainName: /LM/W3SVC/1/ROOT-1-129821937733610609 
     ThreadIdentity:  
     WindowsIdentity: NT AUTHORITY\IUSR 
     Severity: 2 
     MachineIPAddress: 127.0.0.1 

Edit3: Just want to throw this extra code chunk so people see how I'm testing these exceptions (and maybe it's the wrong way to test...). In my first code chunk, I have the call inside the try block to "return Components.PWD.GetConversionErrors();", here's that method:

    public static DataSet GetConversionErrors()
    {
        DB db = new DB();

        try
        {
            //return db.ExecuteDataset(Configuration.GenericConfig.AppConnectionString, CommandType.Text, spGetConversionErrors);
            throw new Exception("Test the text/html text/xml message.");
        }
        catch
        {
            throw;
        }
    }

As you can see, I've commented out the actual call, and just threw in my own line that will throw an exception everytime for testing purposes...

Edit4: @gbvb Here's the new method:

    [WebMethod]
    [SoapHeader("authenticationHeader")]
    [WebServiceAuthentication(AuthenticationRequired = false)]
    public DataSet GetConversionErrors()
    {
        try
        {
            return Components.PWD.GetConversionErrors();
        }
        catch (Exception ex)
        {
            //PublishingManager.Publish(ex, HttpContext.Current.User.Identity.Name);
            //throw Components.SoapException.GenerateSoapException(ex, Context);

            System.Xml.XmlDocument xmlDoc = new System.Xml.XmlDocument();
            System.Xml.XmlNode detailNode = xmlDoc.CreateNode(System.Xml.XmlNodeType.Element, System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapException.DetailElementName.Name, System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapException.DetailElementName.Namespace);
            detailNode.InnerText = ex.ToString();

            throw new System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapException(ex.Message, System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapException.ClientFaultCode, System.Web.HttpContext.Current.Request.Url.AbsoluteUri, detailNode, ex.InnerException);
        }
    }

Edit5: What Fiddler2 saw:

HTTP/1.1 500 Internal Server Error
Cache-Control: private
Content-Type: text/html
Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.5
X-Powered-By: ASP.NET
Date: Wed, 23 May 2012 19:25:56 GMT
Content-Length: 1208

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"/>
<title>500 - Internal server error.</title>
<style type="text/css">
<!--
body{margin:0;font-size:.7em;font-family:Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;background:#EEEEEE;}
fieldset{padding:0 15px 10px 15px;} 
h1{font-size:2.4em;margin:0;color:#FFF;}
h2{font-size:1.7em;margin:0;color:#CC0000;} 
h3{font-size:1.2em;margin:10px 0 0 0;color:#000000;} 
#header{width:96%;margin:0 0 0 0;padding:6px 2% 6px 2%;font-family:"trebuchet MS", Verdana, sans-serif;color:#FFF;
background-color:#555555;}
#content{margin:0 0 0 2%;position:relative;}
.content-container{background:#FFF;width:96%;margin-top:8px;padding:10px;position:relative;}
-->
</style>
</head>
<body>
<div id="header"><h1>Server Error</h1></div>
<div id="content">
 <div class="content-container"><fieldset>
  <h2>500 - Internal server error.</h2>
  <h3>There is a problem with the resource you are looking for, and it cannot be displayed.</h3>
 </fieldset></div>
</div>
</body>
</html>

If anyone knows out to nicely format this section, please do :)

Answer 1

So, I got it to work. Here's what I found out:

When viewing the properties of my website in IIS, then choosing "Modules", there is an entry called "CustomErrorModule" that is trying to process the errors that are getting thrown by the website/web service.

The fix is to either remove that entry "CustomErrorModule", or update my configuration file from:

<httpErrors errorMode="Custom" existingResponse="Replace">

to:

<httpErrors errorMode="Custom" existingResponse="Auto">

Thanks everyone for the help, it steered me in the right direction. (BTW, I'm updating the config file so I don't have to mess with the module stuff)

Also, here's a link explaining this situation.

Answer 2

Just for giggles, can you try explicitly throwing new SoapException() with the SoapException.ClientFaultCode as the type from that call? obviously, you have several layers that could be failing in the code you show above and it is easy to mess up (believe me, I know :)). And dont call the other methods such as Publisher.publish.. that will point at whether it is the message declaration (i.e. ASMX infrastructure) or is it your code that is messing with the exception..