Re: I wish exceptions would give you access to the stack trace

From:
brangdon@cix.co.uk (Dave Harris)
Newsgroups:
comp.lang.c++.moderated
Date:
Thu, 10 Mar 2011 16:52:59 CST
Message-ID:
<memo.20110310201226.5780A@brangdon.cix.compulink.co.uk>
marlow.andrew@gmail.com (Andrew) wrote (abridged):

I wish exceptions would give you access to the stack trace like they
do in Java.


Why?

Does no-one else think this would be a good thing?


For me the benefit would be minimal. Generally I need only to know the
stack when diagnosing bugs, and then I can get it from a crash dump or
from a debugging tool.

Indeed, I like my exception handling to be simple, and to not depend very
much on what the exception is. So exceptions are the last place I'd need
a stack trace. If I do need to know something about the context in which
a call happens, I can manage it explicitly, and at a higher level of
abstraction. A stack trace is a rather low-level, implementation-specific
way of thinking about code. It's useful when debugging, but not something
to design real code around.

I suppose some C++ers would be worried about the runtime and
memory consumption costs.


It is indeed difficult to see how to fit this with the "only pay for what
you use" principle.

-- Dave Harris, Nottingham, UK.

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