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by tialaramex
928 days ago
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> To single it out as an error handling problem specifically is flawed. Sure, product types are the wrong shape for several different problems, not just error handling. Go doesn't have any other shape of user defined types so... too bad you're just stuck with something the wrong shape. Errors are an example where it's more obvious to more people. Also the machine actually does know about errors, for example the x86-64 architecture defines several kinds of faults, for which provided handlers will be executed, Linux actually deliberately makes it impossible to run such fault handlers after any other way to reboot has proved ineffective, then trips a fault, because it knows an x86 CPU which can't run the fault handlers despite a fault will give up and reboot, which is what Linux was trying to achieve anyway. ARM has error interrupts, POWER has layers of nested error handling. |
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While that is true, the shape has no bearing on the handling problem. Go could have every type shape-defining feature ever conceived and it would still have the very same handling problem – for errors and everything else.
> Errors are an example where it's more obvious to more people.
In my experience, the vast majority of bugs I encounter in the real world are related to the handling problem of non-error values. That is where it is most obvious, and not just in Go. I expect errors only get talked about because it is fashionable to repeat what someone else said, not because anyone put any thought into it.
> Also the machine actually does know about error
Only within the confines of one human interpretation of how the machine functions, just as is the case for code. The machine itself has no such concept. It doesn't have awareness that a given state is an error or a rainbow.