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authorHans Bolinder <hasse@erlang.org>2015-03-12 15:35:13 +0100
committerBjörn Gustavsson <bjorn@erlang.org>2015-03-12 17:42:20 +0100
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Update Erlang Reference Manual
Language cleaned up by the technical writers xsipewe and tmanevik from Combitech. Proofreading and corrections by Hans Bolinder.
Diffstat (limited to 'system/doc/reference_manual/errors.xml')
-rw-r--r--system/doc/reference_manual/errors.xml67
1 files changed, 37 insertions, 30 deletions
diff --git a/system/doc/reference_manual/errors.xml b/system/doc/reference_manual/errors.xml
index dde6e68f4a..66ecf6aa94 100644
--- a/system/doc/reference_manual/errors.xml
+++ b/system/doc/reference_manual/errors.xml
@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@
<chapter>
<header>
<copyright>
- <year>2003</year><year>2013</year>
+ <year>2003</year><year>2015</year>
<holder>Ericsson AB. All Rights Reserved.</holder>
</copyright>
<legalnotice>
@@ -38,12 +38,12 @@
<item>Run-time errors</item>
<item>Generated errors</item>
</list>
- <p>A compile-time error, for example a syntax error, should not
+ <p>A compile-time error, for example a syntax error, does not
cause much trouble as it is caught by the compiler.</p>
<p>A logical error is when a program does not behave as intended,
- but does not crash. An example could be that nothing happens when
+ but does not crash. An example is that nothing happens when
a button in a graphical user interface is clicked.</p>
- <p>A run-time error is when a crash occurs. An example could be
+ <p>A run-time error is when a crash occurs. An example is
when an operator is applied to arguments of the wrong type.
The Erlang programming language has built-in features for
handling of run-time errors.</p>
@@ -54,23 +54,23 @@
of class <c>error</c>.
</p>
<p>A generated error is when the code itself calls
- <c>exit/1</c> or <c>throw/1</c>. Note that emulated run-time
+ <c>exit/1</c> or <c>throw/1</c>. Notice that emulated run-time
errors are not denoted as generated errors here.
</p>
<p>Generated errors are exceptions of classes <c>exit</c> and
<c>throw</c>.
</p>
<p>When a run-time error or generated error occurs in Erlang,
- execution for the process which evaluated
+ execution for the process that evaluated
the erroneous expression is stopped.
This is referred to as a <em>failure</em>, that execution or
evaluation <em>fails</em>, or that the process <em>fails</em>,
- <em>terminates</em> or <em>exits</em>. Note that a process may
+ <em>terminates</em>, or <em>exits</em>. Notice that a process can
terminate/exit for other reasons than a failure.</p>
- <p>A process that terminates will emit an <em>exit signal</em> with
+ <p>A process that terminates emits an <em>exit signal</em> with
an <em>exit reason</em> that says something about which error
- has occurred. Normally, some information about the error will
- be printed to the terminal.</p>
+ has occurred. Normally, some information about the error is
+ printed to the terminal.</p>
</section>
<section>
@@ -78,10 +78,12 @@
<p>Exceptions are run-time errors or generated errors and
are of three different classes, with different origins. The
<seealso marker="expressions#try">try</seealso> expression
- (appeared in Erlang 5.4/OTP-R10B)
+ (new in Erlang 5.4/OTP R10B)
can distinguish between the different classes, whereas the
<seealso marker="expressions#catch">catch</seealso>
- expression can not. They are described in the Expressions chapter.</p>
+ expression cannot. They are described in
+ <seealso marker="expressions">Expressions
+ </seealso>.</p>
<table>
<row>
<cell align="left" valign="middle"><em>Class</em></cell>
@@ -89,7 +91,9 @@
</row>
<row>
<cell align="left" valign="middle"><c>error</c></cell>
- <cell align="left" valign="middle">Run-time error for example <c>1+a</c>, or the process called <c>erlang:error/1,2</c> (appeared in Erlang 5.4/OTP-R10B)</cell>
+ <cell align="left" valign="middle">Run-time error,
+ for example, <c>1+a</c>, or the process called
+ <c>erlang:error/1,2</c> (new in Erlang 5.4/OTP R10B)</cell>
</row>
<row>
<cell align="left" valign="middle"><c>exit</c></cell>
@@ -102,11 +106,11 @@
<tcaption>Exception Classes.</tcaption>
</table>
<p>An exception consists of its class, an exit reason
- (the <seealso marker="#exit_reasons">Exit Reason</seealso>),
- and a stack trace (that aids in finding the code location of
+ (see <seealso marker="#exit_reasons">Exit Reason</seealso>),
+ and a stack trace (which aids in finding the code location of
the exception).</p>
<p>The stack trace can be retrieved using
- <c>erlang:get_stacktrace/0</c> (new in Erlang 5.4/OTP-R10B)
+ <c>erlang:get_stacktrace/0</c> (new in Erlang 5.4/OTP R10B)
from within a <c>try</c> expression, and is returned for
exceptions of class <c>error</c> from a <c>catch</c> expression.</p>
<p>An exception of class <c>error</c> is also known as a run-time
@@ -114,38 +118,38 @@
</section>
<section>
- <title>Handling of Run-Time Errors in Erlang</title>
+ <title>Handling of Run-time Errors in Erlang</title>
<section>
<title>Error Handling Within Processes</title>
<p>It is possible to prevent run-time errors and other
exceptions from causing
the process to terminate by using <c>catch</c> or
- <c>try</c>, see the Expressions chapter about
- <seealso marker="expressions#catch">Catch</seealso>
- and <seealso marker="expressions#try">Try</seealso>.</p>
+ <c>try</c>, see <seealso marker="expressions">
+ Expressions</seealso> about
+ <seealso marker="expressions#catch">catch</seealso>
+ and <seealso marker="expressions#try">try</seealso>.</p>
</section>
<section>
<title>Error Handling Between Processes</title>
<p>Processes can monitor other processes and detect process
terminations, see
- the <seealso marker="processes#errors">Processes</seealso>
- chapter.</p>
+ <seealso marker="processes#errors">Processes</seealso>.</p>
</section>
</section>
<section>
<marker id="exit_reasons"></marker>
<title>Exit Reasons</title>
- <p>When a run-time error occurs,
- that is an exception of class <c>error</c>,
- the exit reason is a tuple <c>{Reason,Stack}</c>.
+ <p>When a run-time error occurs,
+ that is an exception of class <c>error</c>.
+ The exit reason is a tuple <c>{Reason,Stack}</c>, where
<c>Reason</c> is a term indicating the type of error:</p>
<table>
<row>
<cell align="left" valign="middle"><em>Reason</em></cell>
- <cell align="left" valign="middle"><em>Type of error</em></cell>
+ <cell align="left" valign="middle"><em>Type of Error</em></cell>
</row>
<row>
<cell align="left" valign="middle"><c>badarg</c></cell>
@@ -181,7 +185,7 @@
</row>
<row>
<cell align="left" valign="middle"><c>{badfun,F}</c></cell>
- <cell align="left" valign="middle">There is something wrong with a fun <c>F</c>.</cell>
+ <cell align="left" valign="middle">Something is wrong with a fun <c>F</c>.</cell>
</row>
<row>
<cell align="left" valign="middle"><c>{badarity,F}</c></cell>
@@ -201,14 +205,17 @@
</row>
<row>
<cell align="left" valign="middle"><c>system_limit</c></cell>
- <cell align="left" valign="middle">A system limit has been reached. See Efficiency Guide for information about system limits.</cell>
+ <cell align="left" valign="middle">A system limit has been reached.
+ See <seealso marker="doc/efficiency_guide:advanced">
+ Efficiency Guide</seealso> for information about system limits.
+ </cell>
</row>
- <tcaption>Exit Reasons.</tcaption>
+ <tcaption>Exit Reasons</tcaption>
</table>
<p><c>Stack</c> is the stack of function calls being evaluated
when the error occurred, given as a list of tuples
<c>{Module,Name,Arity}</c> with the most recent function call
- first. The most recent function call tuple may in some
+ first. The most recent function call tuple can in some
cases be <c>{Module,Name,[Arg]}</c>.</p>
</section>
</chapter>