Factory that doesn't return an object silently inject null

[rngadam]

Factory that return null instead of an object silently inject null object:

Example:

http://plnkr.co/edit/SJM7yZafOxV0Vu6peLQL?p=preview

var app = angular.module('plunker', []);

app.factory('api', function() {
  var self = this;
  // no returns...
  // return self;
});

app.controller('MainCtrl', function($scope, api) {
  if(api) {
    $scope.name = 'api injected';
  } else {
    $scope.name = 'api not injected';
  }
});

ACTUAL: no errors on console, $scope.name set to api not injected

EXPECTED: some sort of console warning with a useful error for newbies

[btford]

👍

[caitp]

We could take it a step further and throw a minErr if the factory function doesn't return something which isn't null/false/undefined, how does that sound? Ditto for the provider itself, I guess

Throwing a minErr is a pretty trivial patch to write, unfortunately using the $log service within the injector is less easy. This may not be totally possible to do without throwing. And throwing unfortunately breaks some tests (the rethrow mock provider returns no value, and I can't find where it's actually defined -_-)

shrug. I guess this could possibly break a bunch of apps anyways, so maybe it's better not to bother until 1.3