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I agree and I think the conclusion is that it's up to the caller to decide what is exceptional. But unfortunately it's the callee who decides how the result is

I agree and I think the conclusion is that it's up to the caller to decide what is exceptional. But unfortunately it's the callee who decides how the result is returned. And it's not only the caller, but also the caller of the caller, and so on, who needs to be prepared for exceptions. This all has severe ramifications on the code structure. > There's no need to be dismissive. I refer to simple as simple to use, not simple to conceptualise. Sorry. I need to control myself. It's not about you. As another commenter stated there is an agreed upon distinction between simple and easy. The distinction is important especially among programmers, and what you described might be easy but it's not simple.

beaconstudios 8y ago
agreed, there are better ways to handle such circumstances (such as an Either/Validation monad). But I still think exceptions are better than error codes. If you don't handle an error code, you can proceed through your application in an invalid state. If you don't handle an exception, the application crashes out. I think the latter is preferable in most circumstances.
- jstimpfle 8y ago
  Yes, and this is the reason why I'm happy with exceptions for short scripts, e.g. Python. It's a different story for larger projects where I make all the primitives by myself. There I start by explicitly aborting on cases that are not handled yet (no exceptions needed to do that), and then I gradually change the structure of the code to handle more and more "exceptional" cases.
  - beaconstudios 8y ago
    I suspect you're the exceptional case though (ha ha) because error codes don't cater to inexperienced developers as well as exceptions do. They are much more liable to cause your application to fail silently unless you explicitly prevent it, as you do. Good tools are all about enabling average or inexperienced developers to not fall into those pitfalls so from that perspective, exceptions are better. Usually those tools aren't very nuanced so they can get in the way of experienced or skilled developers and you end up battling the framework instead of getting productive work done. That sucks, but it's a trade-off most companies (consciously or unconsciously) accept.

beaconstudios 8y ago

agreed, there are better ways to handle such circumstances (such as an Either/Validation monad). But I still think exceptions are better than error codes. If you don't handle an error code, you can proceed through your application in an invalid state. If you don't handle an exception, the application crashes out. I think the latter is preferable in most circumstances.

jstimpfle 8y ago
Yes, and this is the reason why I'm happy with exceptions for short scripts, e.g. Python. It's a different story for larger projects where I make all the primitives by myself. There I start by explicitly aborting on cases that are not handled yet (no exceptions needed to do that), and then I gradually change the structure of the code to handle more and more "exceptional" cases.
- beaconstudios 8y ago
  I suspect you're the exceptional case though (ha ha) because error codes don't cater to inexperienced developers as well as exceptions do. They are much more liable to cause your application to fail silently unless you explicitly prevent it, as you do. Good tools are all about enabling average or inexperienced developers to not fall into those pitfalls so from that perspective, exceptions are better. Usually those tools aren't very nuanced so they can get in the way of experienced or skilled developers and you end up battling the framework instead of getting productive work done. That sucks, but it's a trade-off most companies (consciously or unconsciously) accept.