I have noticed me writing try-except clauses like the following very much in the past. The main reason for this is to write less code.
class Synchronizer(object):
# ...
def _assert_dir(self, dirname, argname, argnum):
""" *Private*. Raises OSError if the passed string does not point
to an existing directory on the file-system. """
if not os.path.isdir(dirname):
message = 'passed `%s` argument (%d) does not point to a ' \
'directory on the file-system.'
raise OSError(message % (argname, argnum))
def synchronize(self, source_dir, dest_dir, database):
# Ensure the passed directories do exist.
try:
self._assert_dir(source_dir, 'source_dir', 2)
self._assert_dir(dest_dir, 'dest_dir', 3)
except OSError:
raise
# ...
I was doing it this way, because otherwise I would've needed to write
class Synchronizer(object):
# ...
def synchronize(self, source_dir, dest_dir, database):
# Ensure the passed directories do exist.
if not os.path.isdir(source_dir):
message = 'passed `source_dir` argument (2) does not point to a ' \
'directory on the file-system.'
raise OSError(message)
if not os.path.isdir(dest_dir):
message = 'passed `dest_dir` argument (3) does not point to a ' \
'directory on the file-system.'
raise OSError(message)
# ...
I actually like the idea of writing methods doing check-and-raise operations, but I see one big disadvantage: Readability. Especially for editors that do code-folding, the try statement is not very much telling the reader what happens inside of it, while if not os.path.isdir(source_dir) is quite a good hint.
IMHO the try-except clause is required because it would confuse the catcher of the exception (reader of the traceback) where the exception comes from.
What do you think about this design? Is it awful, great or confusing to you? Or do you have any ideas on how to improve the situation?
There are two questions that I ask myself before using try for handling exceptional conditions and if the answer is YES to both, only then I will try to handle the exception.
Q1. Is this truly an exception scenario? I do not want to execute try blocks if the condition occurs 90% of the time. It is better to use if - else in such a case.
Q2. Can I recover from the error? It makes little sense to handle the exception if I cannot recover from it. It's better to propagate it to a higher level which happens automatically without me having to write extra code.
The code posted by you does not do anything to recover if the directory does not exist and it does not appear that you can do much about it. Why not let the error propagate to a higher level? Why do you even need a try block there?
This depends upon your requirement..
If you want to catch some exception, and continue with the code in your method, then you should use the 2nd scenario. Have yout try-except block inside your method.
def function():
try:
raise IOError
except IOError e:
// Handle
//continue with reset of the function
print "This will get printed"
function()
But if you want to handle all the exception at one place, with specific action for specific type, or you just want to halt your function, if one exception is raised, you can better handle them outside your function: -
def function():
raise IOError
// subsequent code Will not execute
print "This will not get printed"
try:
function()
except IOError e:
// Handle IOError
except EOFError e1:
// Handle EOF Error
By using the 2nd way, you are actually increasing the chance of some of your codes not getting executed. In general, your try-except block should be small. They should be separated for handling exception at different points and not all the exceptions should be handled at one place.
As far as I'm concerned, I generally like to minimize my try-except block as much as possible. That way I know where exactly my exception was raised.
Related
I'm currently coding my first larger script which is a console based GUI where the user selects options by entering numbers to start several tasks:
I've recently implemented a lot of error handling to prevent the window from closing if something goes wrong in the background. I'm a little bit confused whether or not my approach is correct.
The basic structure of my code is as following:
There is a function read_excel() which loads some Excel files with pandas:
def read_excel(excel_path):
try:
df = pd.read_excel(excel_path, encoding="utf-8")
except FileNotFoundError:
raise FileNotFoundError('Unable to load assignment file, maybe choose custom')
return
# do stuff....
if not all(len(x) == len(signalnames) for x in [frequencies, cans]):
raise ValueError('Frequency and can number must be given for every signal in assignment file!')
else:
logging.info("Successfully loaded assignment file")
return signalnames, frequencies, group_names, cans, can_paths
This function is then used together with others in the function ft_14() which is called by the GUI:
def ft_14(files, draft assignement_path):
try:
signalnames, frequencies, group_names, cans, can_paths = read_excel(assignement_path)
except (ValueError, FileNotFoundError) as e:
logging.error(e)
return
# do stuff..
try:
wb.save(os.path.join(os.path.dirname(files[0]), "FT.14_results.xlsx"))
wb.close()
except Exception:
logging.error('Unable to save report excel')
So my attempt is to raise exceptions in the backend and then except them in functions which are called by the GUI and use logging to display them for the user. So my question is if this approach is the correct way to use exceptions and logging together or if there is a smarter way, because calling:
try:
# some function()
except Exection as e:
logging.error(e)
doesn't feel right to me.
The code you posted at the end, which makes you uncomfortable, is correct in that it does what it says it will do. If there is an exception, it logs the error.
The concern is that it also handles the exception. In many cases, you don't want to change anything else in the exception handling process -- you just want to log, and let the exception propagate normally.
https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/errors.html#raising-exceptions
import logging
logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)
def fn(x):
try:
return x / 0
except Exception as e:
logger.error(str(e))
raise e
print ("let's do something risky")
try:
fn(20)
except Exception as e:
pass
print ("it has been done")
Notice how fn(x) can detect and handle exceptions, then re-raise them as if it had not done anything to the exception at all? You do that with "raise" and no arguments.
In your first code example, you catch an exception, and then raise a completely different exception, which happens to be of the same type:
except FileNotFoundError:
raise FileNotFoundError('Unable to load assignment file, maybe choose custom')
This can be fair game if you want to hide info, for example if the exception has internal details you do not want to expose to the outside. But you don't know what info you lost by replacing the exception entirely with a new instance. But none of those is "right" or "wrong," they're just choices you make with how to handle exceptions. (edit: it is good practice to handle them eventually or document what it can throw, but we're off topic)
None of that matters to the logger. You could have logged it right there and re-raised. You could log the original exception, then raise the sanitized version. You could handle it there, log it, and not raise (as the example you posted). The logger doesn't care what you do with the exception. If you want it logged, log it immediately.
In Python, is there any (proper) way to change the the default exception handling behaviour so that any uncaught exception will terminate/exit the program?
I don't want to wrap the entire program in a generic try-except block:
try:
// write code here
except Exception:
sys.exit(1)
For those asking for more specificity and/or claiming this is already the case, it's my understanding that not all Python exceptions are system-exiting: docs
Edit: It looks like I have forked processes complicating matters so won't be posting any specific details about my own mess.
If you're looking for an answer to the original question, Dmitry's comment is interesting and useful, references the 2nd answer to this question
You can use Specific exception instead of Exception because Exception is a Base class for all exceptions. For more details refer Exception tutorial
You can write your script like this-
try:
# write code here
except OverflowError:
raise SystemExit
except ArithmeticError:
sys.exit()
except IOError:
quit()
Try this different approaches to find what is exactly you are missing.
Edit 1 - Maintain Program Execution
In order to maintain your program execution try this one-
consider error_handler function is raising SystemExit exception then In your main method you need to add below code so you can maintain your program execution.
try:
error_handler()
except SystemExit:
print "sys.exit was called but I'm proceeding anyway (so there!-)."
I have some code which represents a test case within a proprietary testing framework that looks something like this:
def test_alarm(self):
self.setup_some_test_data()
try:
self.send_alarm_message()
except:
print "Unexpected error:", sys.exc_info()
finally:
self.teardown_some_test_data()
I've been told to drop the print as it's not necessary and the test framework will in any case catch any exceptions, which is preferred to catching them here, but I still need to always clear the data down, as in the finally block.
Do I just drop the except block entirely? Alternatively, how, can I structure the code to effectively have an empty except block and retain the finally? Is this good practice in Python or is there a better way to do it?
Edit Note that I did try just dropping the except block entirely, and I had no obvious run-time problems, though since exceptions are unlikely in the the call to send_alarm_message(), it was unclear to me how it would work if an exception was thrown or whether this was considered good practice by the Python community.
Either drop the except Block, or improove it really by adding
except [Exception-Class]:
pass
where [Exception-Class] is the exception to be excepted. This adds some sugar on it, because really unexpected Errors are not getting catched by this. (Or add this as a seperate:
except Exception, ex:
print "Unexpected error:", ex
Yes, you can drop the except block completely, it is a valid python syntax to have just try and finally . Example -
In [58]: try:
....: print("Blah")
....: finally:
....: print("halB")
....:
Blah
halB
Please note this will not catch any Exceptions/Errors that occur within the try block, and I am guessing that is what you want.
I have seen this used at quite some places, where we are creating some variables/resources that need to be cleared irrespective of whether any exceptions/errors occur, but we do not want to handle any Exceptions at that particular place.
If you don't want to do anything in except block, then you can pass it.
try:
self.send_alarm_message()
except:
pass
finally:
self.teardown_some_test_data()
I'm trying to catch some exceptions thrown by the requests library, with the following try-except block:
try:
get = requests.get((requester.batchesUrl)+str(id)+'/', auth=requester.auth)
except (ConnectionRefusedError, ConnectionError, MaxRetryError) as e:
print("CAUGHT ECONNECTION ERROR")
raise type(e)(str(e) + "Additional Info: Method couldn't connect to website, check that your server is running"
).with_traceback(sys.exc_info()[2])
But instead of catching the exceptions and adding "Additional Info:" to the args, I get NameError: global name 'MaxRetryError' is not defined. Now I know MaxRetryError is an exception in urllib3.exceptions.MaxRetryError. Must I import these non-built-in exception in order to catch them? This seems verbose to me considering the number of possible exceptions one is likely to need to watch out for.
Running: Python 3.3, Windows 7.
You must always always always have a name in an accessible scope before you can refer to it without throwing an exception. If that means importing, then so be it.
If you want to handle these three exceptions differently from other exceptions, then yes, you will have to import them. (You already have at least one of them, since it's at the top level of requests, but the others you may not.)
But do you really need to do that? Trying to restrict yourself to the most detailed exception possible can be as bad as just handling everything. Sometimes both extremes are the right thing to do, but think about what you really want to happen.
If you get a RequestException, but it's not a ConnectionError, do you really want that to print a traceback and abort, or do you want to log that CAUGHT ECONNECTION ERROR and reraise it wrapped in your own type? For that matter, what about an OSError that isn't a RequestException?
As a side note, do you really get urllib3.exception.*Errors from requests? I've only seen them wrapped in a requests.exceptions.RequestException. (And from a quick look at the source to HTTPAdapter.send, there's a except MaxRetryError as e: raise ConnectionError(e, request=request), so I think they're supposed to be wrapped, and if you're seeing them unwrapped that may be a bug you need to file.)
As another side note, in Python 3.3, you don't have to hack with exception messages like that anymore; you can chain and wrap exceptions, add arguments, etc. See Exceptions in the docs for more details. But I think what you want here may be to define your own exception type, then do this:
try:
get = requests.get((requester.batchesUrl)+str(id)+'/', auth=requester.auth)
except OSError as e:
print("CAUGHT ECONNECTION ERROR")
raise EConnectionError("Method couldn't connect to website, check that your server is running")
That will put the original exception in the __context__ of your wrapper exception. If you want it in the __cause__ instead, then raise EConnectionError(…) from e. Either way, it'll show up if you format the traceback.
You must import, etc. in order to catch specific exceptions.
Of course you could simply catch everything.
But the real issue may be that you need to understand why you should catch exceptions.
There are really only few cases I can think of.
1) You catch specific exceptions so that you can respond to them effectively -- If you don't know how to respond to them (requiring an understanding of what they mean and how to respond) -- Since these are generally few in number, this is not a real problem in having to import a number of modules.
2) You catch exceptions so that you can continue processing the next transaction, etc. -- though you abandon the current operation, you may still be able to continue processing acceptablely if the transactions are independent.
3) You catch the exception so that you can log detail, etc. Often re-raising the transaction after you have logged it.
4) You have a top-level exception handler so that you can report the problem in a clean manner to the end-user and possibly do some thing like saving work-in-progress before it is lost.
ADDED
You don't just willy nilly catch exceptions so that you can ignore them unless you like pain.
I find I've been confused by the problem that when I needn't to use try..except.For last few days it was used in almost every function I defined which I think maybe a bad practice.For example:
class mongodb(object):
def getRecords(self,tname,conditions=''):
try:
col = eval("self.db.%s" %tname)
recs = col.find(condition)
return recs
except Exception,e:
#here make some error log with e.message
What I thought is ,exceptions may be raised everywhere and I have to use try to get them.
And my question is,is it a good practice to use it everywhere when defining functions?If not are there any principles for it?Help would be appreciated!
Regards
That may not be the best thing to do. Whole point of exceptions is that you can catch them on very different level than it's raised. It's best to handle them in the place where you have enough information to make something useful with them (that is very application and context dependent).
For example code below can throw IOError("[Errno 2] No such file or directory"):
def read_data(filename):
return open(filename).read()
In that function you don't have enough information to do something with it, but in place where you actually using this function, in case of such exception, you may decide to try different filename or display error to the user, or something else:
try:
data = read_data('data-file.txt')
except IOError:
data = read_data('another-data-file.txt')
# or
show_error_message("Data file was not found.")
# or something else
This (catching all possible exceptions very broadly) is indeed considered bad practice. You'll mask the real reason for the exception.
Catch only 'explicitely named' types of exceptions (which you expect to happen and you can/will handle gracefully). Let the rest (unexpected ones) bubble as they should.
You can log these (uncaught) exceptions (globally) by overriding sys.excepthook:
import sys
import traceback
# ...
def my_uncaught_exception_hook(exc_type, exc_value, exc_traceback):
msg_exc = "".join( \
traceback.format_exception(exc_type, exc_value, exc_traceback) )
# ... log here...
sys.excepthook = my_uncaught_exception_hook # our uncaught exception hook
You must find a balance between several goals:
An application should recover from as many errors as possible by itself.
An application should report all unrecoverable errors with enough detail to fix the cause of the problem.
Errors can happen everywhere but you don't want to pollute your code with all the error handling code.
Applications shouldn't crash
To solve #3, you can use an exception hook. All unhandled exceptions will cause the current transaction to abort. Catch them at the highest level, roll back the transaction (so the database doesn't become inconsistent) and either throw them again or swallow them (so the app doesn't crash). You should use decorators for this. This solves #4 and #1.
The solution for #2 is experience. You will learn with time what information you need to solve problems. The hard part is to still have the information when an error happens. One solution is to add debug logging calls in the low level methods.
Another solution is a dictionary per thread in which you can store some bits and which you dump when an error happens.
another option is to wrap a large section of code in a try: except: (for instance in a web application, one specific GUI page) and then use sys.exc_info() to print out the error and also the stack where it occurred
import sys
import traceback
try:
#some buggy code
x = ??
except:
print sys.exc_info()[0] #prints the exception class
print sys.exc_info()[1] #prints the error message
print repr(traceback.format_tb(sys.exc_info()[2])) #prints the stack