C1: Exception Handling

CPSC 210

Learning Goals

To determine whether or not a method’s specification is robust
To design robust method specifications using exception handling
To determine the flow-of-control when a method throws an exception

Why Exceptions?

// REQUIRES: numItems > 0
// MODIFIES: this
// EFFECTS: adds numItems to quantity of
//  items purchased on this line item
public void addQuantity(int numItems) {
  this.quantity += numItems;
}

Let's break this!!

lineItem.addQuantity(-1);

What do we want instead?

My Dear Caller - I see you passed in a 
negative number to our addQuantity method. 
This is not supported. We kindly ask you to 
enter a positive number.

Method is not robust:
REQUIRES clause excludes values

Why Exceptions? (2)

Especially for public methods, we usually cannot rely on values adhering to what we require!
We need to be prepared for exceptional cases!

// MODIFIES: this
// EFFECTS: adds numItems to quantity of
//  items purchased on this line item
//  IF numItems < 1
//	  throws IllegalNumberException
public void addQuantity(int numItems) 
	throws IllegalNumberException {   
    
  if (numItems < 1) {
    throw new IllegalNumberException();
  }
  this.quantity += numItems;
}

Method is robust: specifies behaviour for ALL inputs

Exceptions

public class IllegalNumberException extends Exception {
	
}

Exceptions are thrown when a problem occurs
Exception class is part of the Java library
- Any exception is an instance of that class or a subclass
The caller will have the choice to:
- catch the exception and address the problem
- propagate (= throw) the exception further to its caller

Exceptions (2)

There are two kinds of exceptions:
- checked
- unchecked
Today we focus only on checked exceptions (don’t worry about the difference for now)

Call Stack & Throwing Exceptions

catch?

LineItem
addQuantity

GroceryBill
addPurchase

GroceryApp

main

Catching Exceptions

catch?

public void addPurchase(GroceryItem item, int quantity) {
  // ...
  try {
    entry.addQuantity(quantity);
  } catch (IllegalNumberException e) {
    System.err.println("Quantity could not be added: " + quantity);
  }
  // ...	
}

LineItem
addQuantity

GroceryBill
addPurchase

GroceryApp

main

The Finally Keyword

Sometimes we want to execute code no matter if there was an exception caught or not

public void addPurchase(GroceryItem item, int quantity) {
  // ...
  try {
    entry.addQuantity(quantity);
  } catch (IllegalNumberException e) {
    System.err.println("Quantity could not be added: " + quantity);
  } finally {
    System.out.println("Your quantity might have been added. Not sure.");
  }
  // ...	
}

The Finally Keyword (2)

A more real-life example

public void writeStringToFile(String string) {
  FileWriter fw = new FileWriter("OutputFile.txt")
  PrintWriter pw = new PrintWriter(fw);
  try {
    pw.println(string);
  } catch (IOException e) {
    System.out.println("Could not write to file");
  } finally {
    pw.close();
  }
}

We want to close our PrintWriter object no matter if the write process was successful or not

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edX > C1 > Lecture Lab

C1: Exception Handling

The End - Thank You!

Extra Slides...

a try/catch/finally statement...

normally: executes its try block and then finishes normally
must have at least one clause besides try (a catch or finally)
may have any number of catches and up to one finally
at the end of its normal execution, continues to the next statement (like almost any statement except throw/return)
catches exceptions under some circumstances:
- if its try block ends abnormally with an exception object e
  - and it has a catch block like: catch (ExcType e2)
  - where e is a subtype of ExcType
- then it finds the first such block
  - and makes e the value of e2
  - and executes that catch block
  - and then finishes the whole try/catch normally
just before the ending execution (normally or abnormally) executes its finally block (if any) and then resumes ending execution

Throwing Multiple Exceptions

public void addPurchase(GroceryItem item, int quantity)
	throws CouldNotAddPurchaseException {
  // ...
  try {
    entry.addQuantity(quantity);
  } catch (IllegalNumberException e) {
    System.err.println("Quantity could not be added: " + quantity);
    throw new CouldNotAddPurchaseException();
  } // POSSIBLY MORE CATCH CLAUSES TO CATCH OTHER EXCEPTIONS
  // ...	
}

We can catch one exception and throw another...

...this way, different methods in the call stack can treat errors in their own way...

GroceryBill bill = new GroceryBill();
try {
  bill.addPurchase(milk, 2);
} catch (CouldNotAddPurchaseException e) {
  System.err.println("At least one purchase could not be added");
}