Programming: Principles and Practice Using C++, 3rd Edition

4

Errors!

I realized that from now on a large part of my life would be spent finding and correcting my own mistakes.

– Maurice Wilkes, 1949

In this chapter, we discuss correctness of programs, errors, and error handling. If you are a genuine novice, you’ll find the discussion a bit abstract at times and painfully detailed at other times. Can error handling really be this important? It is, and you’ll learn that one way or another before you can write programs that others are willing to use. What we are trying to do is to show you what “thinking like a programmer” is about. It combines fairly abstract strategy with painstaking analysis of details and alternatives.

§4.1 Introduction

§4.2 Sources of errors

§4.3 Compile-time errors

Syntax errors ...