Rescuing SyntaxError

ruby-talk
1

Is it possible to catch illegal syntax errors?

irb(main):001:0> 550p
SyntaxError: compile error

...

# se.rb
begin
   550p
rescue SyntaxError => e
   # This never seems to get run
   puts "Caught a syntax error: " + e
end

~> ruby se.rb
blah.rb:2: syntax error

Thanks,
Caleb

2

Sort of, you have to delay the compilation though:

irb(main):017:0> begin
irb(main):018:1* eval "550p"
irb(main):019:1> rescue SyntaxError => e
irb(main):020:1> puts "Caught a syntax error: " + e
irb(main):021:1> end
Caught a syntax error: (eval):1:in `irb_binding': compile error
(eval):1: syntax error
=> nil

···

On Dec 17, 2005, at 3:04 PM, Caleb Tennis wrote:

Is it possible to catch illegal syntax errors?

irb(main):001:0> 550p
SyntaxError: compile error

...

# se.rb
begin
  550p
rescue SyntaxError => e
  # This never seems to get run
  puts "Caught a syntax error: " + e
end

~> ruby se.rb
blah.rb:2: syntax error

Thanks,
Caleb

3

Caleb Tennis wrote:

Is it possible to catch illegal syntax errors?

irb(main):001:0> 550p
SyntaxError: compile error

...

# se.rb
begin
  550p
rescue SyntaxError => e
  # This never seems to get run
  puts "Caught a syntax error: " + e
end

~> ruby se.rb
blah.rb:2: syntax error

Thanks,
Caleb

[~/tmp] cat se2.rb
begin
  eval <<-END
    begin
      550p
    rescue SyntaxError => e
      # This never seems to get run
      puts "Caught a syntax error: " + e
    end
  END
rescue SyntaxError
  puts "Caught a syntax error during eval"
end
[~/tmp] ruby se2.rb
Caught a syntax error during eval

The reason the inner rescue is not triggered is that the exception
occurs while eval is turning the string into a parse tree, before it
starts executing the parse tree.

···

--
      vjoel : Joel VanderWerf : path berkeley edu : 510 665 3407

4

The reason the inner rescue is not triggered is that the exception
occurs while eval is turning the string into a parse tree, before it
starts executing the parse tree.

--

Sure thing. Is there any way to catch it though?

5

Caleb Tennis wrote:

The reason the inner rescue is not triggered is that the exception
occurs while eval is turning the string into a parse tree, before it
starts executing the parse tree.

Sure thing. Is there any way to catch it though?

begin
  puts "this is text
rescue SyntaxError
  puts "Syntax Error!"
end
__END__

No. How is Ruby supposed to know that the rescue block isn't supposed to be part of that unterminated puts string from the line before? Do the eval, load, or require thing as suggested.

Devin

6

Sure thing. Is there any way to catch it though?

Yes, when you read from a file:

begin
  require "errorfile"
rescue SyntaxError
  puts "Syntax Error!"
end

erorfile.rb:

···

--------------------------------------------------
puts "this is a string
--------------------------------------------------

This is what I use with my cgi scripts / PrettyException.rb

Patrick

7

No. How is Ruby supposed to know that the rescue block isn't supposed to be part of that unterminated puts string from the line before? Do the eval, load, or require thing as suggested.

Yeah, I will. That's what will work in what I'm trying to do anyway. Thanks.

Caleb