I agree. I hate to see the return -1 (for example) on some "exceptional" case in a function when an exception makes more sense. It's not necessarily an "oops" case, it's an "exception." Either way the caller has to check the special case. There is a good reason that exceptions are named exceptions and not errors. Mike Garriss -----Original Message----- From: Peter Dimov [mailto:pdimov@mmltd.net] Sent: Thursday, September 19, 2002 10:20 AM To: Boost-Users@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [Boost-Users] Re: [BGL] Best way to abort an algorithm from withi n a visitor? From: "Mark Storer" <mstorer@cardiff.com>

Using exceptions in this way just bugs me. Religious reasons I guess. As the Esteemed Mr. Hylsop ;) mentioned earlier, exceptions are for "oops". This seems alot like the whole "do{}while(0)" with various 'break' statements sprinkled in to avoid multiple returns/nested ifs. Useful, but Just Not Right.

A common misconception. Many people try to project their own ideas/expectations on language features, rather than simply using them as tools where appropriate. There is nothing "oops"-y about exceptions. They are a control flow mechanism; one that has interesting properties, but a control flow mechanism nonetheless. If it works and leads to a better code, it's foolish to avoid it without a technical reason. A similar example is when people don't use "struct" for C++ classes because it "doesn't feel right", or when trying to choose between "typename" and "class" for template parameters. The language features simply do not carry this kind of religious/emotional payload. It's all in your mind. Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ADVERTISEMENT <http://rd.yahoo.com/M=234081.2377872.3808768.2225242/D=egroupweb/S=17050067 88:HM/A=1225247/R=0/*http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;4547223;7007303;y?http:// www.ameriquestmortgage.com/welcome.html?ad=Yahoo01> <http://us.adserver.yahoo.com/l?M=234081.2377872.3808768.2225242/D=egroupmai l/S=:HM/A=1225247/rand=147617524> Info: < http://www.boost.org <http://www.boost.org> > Wiki: < http://www.crystalclearsoftware.com/cgi-bin/boost_wiki/wiki.pl <http://www.crystalclearsoftware.com/cgi-bin/boost_wiki/wiki.pl> > Unsubscribe: <mailto:boost-users-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service <http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/> . [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]