CS212: Object Oriented Analysis and Design Lecture 19: Exception Handling

Recap of Lecture 18 Virtual destructors Dispatching, single and multiple Downcasting Exception handling

Outline of Lecture 19 Exception handling Try, throw catch Stack unwinding Exception classes

Introduction Exception handling allows you to manage run-time errors In an orderly fashion Program can automatically invoke an error-handling routine It automates much of the error-handling code

Error Conditions Division by 0, or values that are too large or small for a type No memory available for dynamic allocation Errors on file access, for example, file not found Attempt to access an invalid address in main memory Invalid user input

Traditional Error Handling Errors in function calls are indicated by special return values Global error variables or flags are set or unset when errors occur if( func()> 0 ) // Return value positive => o.k. else // Treat errors Error variables and flags must also be checked after every corresponding action. Need to continually check for errors while a program is executing

Exception Handling Concept A new approach to error handling Keeping the normal functionality of the program separate from error handling Errors occurring in one particular part of the program Errors are reported to another part of the program, known as the calling environment The calling environment performs central error handling.

Exception handling in C++ C++ exception handling is built upon three keywords: try, catch, and throw. Program statements to be monitored are contained in a try block If an exception occurs within the try block, it is thrown The exception is caught, using catch, and processed

Structure of try-catch block try { // try block } catch (type1 arg) { // catch block } catch (type2 arg) { // catch block } catch (type3 arg) { // catch block }... catch (typeN arg) { // catch block } Code to be monitored Possible to have more than one catch for a single try Demonstration1

Throwing exception throw generates the exception specified by exception throw must be executed from within a try block itself From any function called from within the try block Demonstration2 A try block can be localized to a function Demonstration3

Stack Unwinding The exception object is then thrown and the program control leaves the try block Any changes to the stack that took place after entering the try block are unwound The process of removing function entries from function call stack at run time is called Stack Unwinding Allows back out of the normal program flow in an orderly manner Demonstration

Searching for Handlers After the try block the PC searchers for the appropriate catch block Always performed sequentially beginning with the first catch block Exception declaration of the handler determines whether the handler should be executed Identical to the exception type thrown A base class of the exception type A base class pointer and the exception is a pointer to a derived class

Multiple catch Statements It is possible to have multiple condition to throw exception For individual throw statement, one catch statement is used Similar to switch statement Demonstration

Catch all/ Generic handler Similar to the tradition switch case, captures any type of exceptions (generic handler) A special syntax in the catch statement with an exception declaration consisting of just three dots. General exception handler to be defined last catch(... ) { // General handler for // all other exceptions }

Exception Classes Exception classes are defined to categorize exceptions throw statement is used to throw an object belonging to a specific exception class. An exception class need not contain data members or methods type, which is used by the calling environment to identify the error, is important Contains members that provide more specific information on the cause of the error

Continuing the Program After executing a handler, the program continues with the first statement following the catch blocks Unless the handler throws another exception Terminates the program After completing exception handling, the exception object that was thrown is destroyed

Catching Class Types An exception can be of class types that you create Most exceptions will be class types rather than built-in types To create an object that describes the error that occurred Information can be used by the exception handler to help it process the error Demonstration5

Nesting exception handling A try block can contain additional try blocks This allows using the handlers in a nested try block for special purpose error handling Leaving the handlers in the surrounding try block to deal with remaining errors You can also nest a try block within a catch block.

try { // Type1 exceptions are thrown here. try { // Type1 and Type2 exceptions are thrown here. } catch( Type2 e2) { // Type2 exceptions are pre-handled here throw; // and thrown again. } // Other Type1 exceptions can be thrown. } catch( Type1 e1) { // Type1 exceptions are handled here. } catch(...) { // All remaining exceptions are handled here, // particularly Type2 exceptions. }

Control transfer in nested case Try blocks are nested and a throw occurs in a function called by an inner try block try { func1(); try { func2(); } catch (spec_err) { /*... */ } func3(); } catch (type_err) { /*... */ } // if no throw is issued, control resumes here.

Standard exceptions C++ Standard library provides a base class Designed to declare objects to be thrown as exceptions Defined in the header This class has a virtual member function called “what” Override in derived classes to contain some sort of description of the exception Demonstration

Types of exceptions ExceptionDescription bad_allocthrown by new on allocation failure bad_castthrown by dynamic_cast when it fails in a dynamic cast bad_exceptionthrown by certain dynamic exception specifiers bad_typeidthrown by typeid bad_function_callthrown by empty function objects All exceptions thrown by components of the C++ Standard library throw exceptions derived from this exception class.

Thank you Next Lecture: Exception Handling