|
Put simply, Error<> is a way of forcing error handling onto an API user.
Given a function like:
bool might_work();
The following code might have been written previously:
might_work(); // but what if it didn't?
The easy way to work around this is of course to [[nodiscard]] might_work.
But this doesn't work for more complex cases like, for instance, a
hypothetical read() function which might return one of _many_ errors
(typically signalled with an int, let's say).
int might_read();
In such a case, the result is often _read_, but not properly handled. Like:
return buffer.substr(0, might_read()); // but what if might_read returned an error?
This is where Error<> comes in:
typedef Error<int, 0> ReadError;
ReadError might_read();
auto res = might_read();
if (might_read.failed()) {
switch (res.value()) {
case EBADF:
...
}
}
Error<> uses clang's consumable attributes to force failed() to be
checked on an Error instance. If it's not checked, then you get smacked.
|
