Professional C++, 4th Edition

14Handling Errors

WHAT’S IN THIS CHAPTER?

• How to handle errors in C++, including pros and cons of exceptions
• The syntax of exceptions
• Exception class hierarchies and polymorphism
• Stack unwinding and cleanup
• Common error-handling situations

WROX.COM DOWNLOADS FOR THIS CHAPTER

Please note that all the code examples for this chapter are available as a part of this chapter’s code download on the book’s website at www.wrox.com/go/proc++4e on the Download Code tab.

Inevitably, your C++ programs will encounter errors. The program might be unable to open a file, the network connection might go down, or the user might enter an incorrect value, to name a few possibilities. The C++ language provides a feature called exceptions to handle these exceptional but not unexpected situations.

The code examples in this book so far have generally ignored error conditions for brevity. This chapter rectifies that simplification by teaching you how to incorporate error handling into your programs from their beginnings. It focuses on C++ exceptions, including the details of their syntax, and describes how to employ them effectively to create well-designed error-handling programs.

ERRORS AND EXCEPTIONS

No program exists in isolation; they all depend on external facilities such as interfaces with the operating system, networks and file systems, external code such as third-party libraries, and user input. Each of these areas can introduce situations that require you to respond to problems ...