Sometimes in software development, business priorities demand immediate action. That was the case recently when our password reset flow started failing for users, while at the same time we received feedback that the recovery emails were unclear and hard to identify. Our development environment was full of ongoing changes, so the safest path was to deliver a focused hotfix straight to production.
I saw in the AWS (ECS Logs) were logs telling that the app was crashed with ReferenceError of Redis.
The Challenges
Two main problems had to be solved:
Email recovery template – Investors reported that password recovery emails were in English only and didn’t include any reference to the company. This made them hard to find and often overlooked. The fix required introducing support for multiple languages, defaulting to English when no language was provided, and including the company name in the email subject.
Redis v4 migration issues – At the same time, our password reset functionality was broken due to a Redis upgrade. Moving to Redis v4 exposed a scoping issue: the Redis client wasn’t being referenced properly, causing ReferenceError: Client not found and crashing our app in ECS logs. Tokens couldn’t be set or validated, which meant the password reset flow completely failed. Fixing this required revisiting the Redis initialization, ensuring proper connection handling, and maintaining compatibility with parts of the codebase still expecting the legacy behavior.
Overcoming the Issues
The hotfix involved:
Creating a new email template in Portuguese, with dynamic company branding in the subject line. To bring the Company's name into the email subject, I had to send a company UUID to another system and then receive the company name.
Adding support for a language parameter in requests, with a fallback to English if none was provided.
Refactoring Redis initialization to ensure the client was accessible across the app.
Adjusting for Redis v4 changes while keeping legacy expectations working until the rest of the system could be migrated.
Business Impact
These fixes had direct and immediate value:
Clearer communication: Password recovery emails now include the company name and are localized, reducing confusion for end users.
Restored critical functionality: Users can once again reset their passwords without encountering errors, eliminating support tickets and frustration.
Stability under change: Despite ongoing development work, the hotfix restored confidence that critical user flows remain reliable.
These changes turned a broken, confusing experience into a smooth, branded, and functional process. It was a reminder that sometimes the fastest path to protecting user trust is a focused hotfix, even when the technical challenges involve version upgrades and tricky scope bugs.
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