I thought I would try a couple of the suggestions here. What I was looking for was criticisms or alternatives to (Java) exception handling, an interest of mine

I thought I would try a couple of the suggestions here. What I was looking for was criticisms or alternatives to (Java) exception handling, an interest of mine. ArXiv may have the the paper but their search interface is pretty primitive. Google Scholar gave much more useful results after tinkering with search terms. My usual approach to finding papers in a new area of interest is to google around until I find a Wikipedia article that looks like a good starting point. I have found Wikipedia itself to be pretty hopeless for searches. In the article or some of those that it links to, I usually find researchers working in my area of interest. Of particular value are survey articles because of the large number of references. Then I follow the authors to their research departments and projects and co-workers. That usually provides a week of reading. If I'm looking for something serendipitous I read the comments here and follow the links.