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Concept
Exception handling
Summary
In computing and computer programming, exception handling is the process of responding to the occurrence of exceptions – anomalous or exceptional conditions requiring special processing – during the execution of a program. In general, an exception breaks the normal flow of execution and executes a pre-registered exception handler; the details of how this is done depend on whether it is a hardware or software exception and how the software exception is implemented. Exception handling, if provided, is facilitated by specialized programming language constructs, hardware mechanisms like interrupts, or operating system (OS) inter-process communication (IPC) facilities like signals. Some exceptions, especially hardware ones, may be handled so gracefully that execution can resume where it was interrupted.
The definition of an exception is based on the observation that each procedure has a precondition, a set of circumstances for which it will terminate "normally". An exception handling mechanism allows the procedure to raise an exception if this precondition is violated, for example if the procedure has been called on an abnormal set of arguments. The exception handling mechanism then handles the exception.
The precondition, and the definition of exception, is subjective. The set of "normal" circumstances is defined entirely by the programmer, e.g. the programmer may deem division by zero to be undefined, hence an exception, or devise some behavior such as returning zero or a special "ZERO DIVIDE" value (circumventing the need for exceptions). Common exceptions include an invalid argument (e.g. value is outside of the domain of a function), an unavailable resource (like a missing file, a hard disk error, or out-of-memory errors), or that the routine has detected a normal condition that requires special handling, e.g., attention, end of file.
Exception handling solves the semipredicate problem, in that the mechanism distinguishes normal return values from erroneous ones.
Official source
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