Error Handling in C++ By Example

John McFarlane, 2021

Introduction

This project contains a toy program written in C++ which demonstrates an error-handling strategy recommended for robust applications. It takes a number and prints the corresponding letter of the alphabet.

Most of the comments in the source code are written to explain the error-handling and bug handling choices made.

Requirements

The program uses some C++20 features and has only been tested with Clang 11 on Ubuntu 20.04.

• Clang-11
• CMake 3.16
• fmt 7.1.3

The build script uses the Conan package manager to install the fmt library.

Instructions

After cloning the repository and changing to the project root folder,

1. Create a build directory e.g. build:

   mkdir build && cd build

2. Build the project using the script provided:

   ../test/scripts/build-clang.sh

3. Run the approval tests:

   ctest

4. Study the code to understand the error-handling strategy proposed.

5. Send questions, feedback and bug reports to the author via the GitHub issues page.