Ron Adam wrote:
Sometime I feel exceptions are overly general. Ok, so I got a ValueError exception from some block of code... But is it the one I expected, or is it one from a routine in a library I imported and wasn't caught or handled correctly. (ie.. my routine called a function in another module someone else wrote.)
I can't say I've very often cared where the exception comes from. But that's because I generally wrap the smallest amount of code possible in an try...except block, so there's only a limited number of places it could come from.
One answer to that is to put the try except around the fewest lines of code possible so that it doesn't catch exceptions that aren't related to some specific condition.
Exactly.
That leads to possibly quite a few more try-except blocks, and possibly more nested try-except blocks. At some point, it may start to seem like it's a better idea to avoid them rather than use them.
Or refactor parts of your code into a function.
What if you can catch an exception specifically from a particular function or method, but let other unexpected "like" exceptions bubble through...
try: ... i = s.index('bar') ... except ValueError from s.index as exc: <handle s.index ValueError>
I can't imagine that this would even be *possible*, but even if it is, I would say it certainly isn't *desirable*.
(1) You're repeating code you expect to fail: you write s.index twice, even though it only gets called once.
(2) The semantics are messy and unclear. Suppose you have this:
try: ... i = s.index(a) j = s.index(b) + s.index(c) t = s k = t.index(d) method = s.index l = method(e) ... except ValueError from s.index: ...
Which potential s.index exceptions will get caught? All of them? Some of them? Only i and j? What if you want to catch only some but not others?
How will this construct apply if s or s.index is rebound, or deleted, inside the try block?
s += "spam" m = s.index(f)
What about this?
alist = ['spam', 'ham', s, 'eggs'] results = [x.index('cheese') for x in alist]
Should your proposal catch an exception in the list comp?
What if you call a function which happens to call s.index? Will that be caught?
x = some_function(spam, ham, s, eggs) # happens to call s.index