While preparing PRs like #9753, I've had to change error messages in
dozens of code paths. It would be nice if instead of
EvalError("expected 'boolean' but found '%1%'", showType(v))
we could write
TypeError(v, "boolean")
or similar. Then, changing the error message could be a mechanical
refactor with the compiler pointing out places the constructor needs to
be changed, rather than the error-prone process of grepping through the
codebase. Structured errors would also help prevent the "same" error
from having multiple slightly different messages, and could be a first
step towards error codes / an error index.
This PR reworks the exception infrastructure in `libexpr` to
support exception types with different constructor signatures than
`BaseError`. Actually refactoring the exceptions to use structured data
will come in a future PR (this one is big enough already, as it has to
touch every exception in `libexpr`).
The core design is in `eval-error.hh`. Generally, errors like this:
state.error("'%s' is not a string", getAttrPathStr())
.debugThrow<TypeError>()
are transformed like this:
state.error<TypeError>("'%s' is not a string", getAttrPathStr())
.debugThrow()
The type annotation has moved from `ErrorBuilder::debugThrow` to
`EvalState::error`.
This keeps hint messages, source location information, and source code
snippets grouped together, while making stack traces shorter (so that
more stack frames can be viewed on the same terminal).
Before:
error:
… while evaluating the attribute 'body'
at /Users/wiggles/nix/tests/functional/lang/eval-fail-assert.nix:4:3:
3|
4| body = x "x";
| ^
5| }
… from call site
at /Users/wiggles/nix/tests/functional/lang/eval-fail-assert.nix:4:10:
3|
4| body = x "x";
| ^
5| }
… while calling 'x'
at /Users/wiggles/nix/tests/functional/lang/eval-fail-assert.nix:2:7:
1| let {
2| x = arg: assert arg == "y"; 123;
| ^
3|
error: assertion '(arg == "y")' failed
at /Users/wiggles/nix/tests/functional/lang/eval-fail-assert.nix:2:12:
1| let {
2| x = arg: assert arg == "y"; 123;
| ^
3|
After:
error:
… while evaluating the attribute 'body'
at /Users/wiggles/nix/tests/functional/lang/eval-fail-assert.nix:4:3:
3|
4| body = x "x";
| ^
5| }
… from call site
at /Users/wiggles/nix/tests/functional/lang/eval-fail-assert.nix:4:10:
3|
4| body = x "x";
| ^
5| }
… while calling 'x'
at /Users/wiggles/nix/tests/functional/lang/eval-fail-assert.nix:2:7:
1| let {
2| x = arg: assert arg == "y"; 123;
| ^
3|
error: assertion '(arg == "y")' failed
at /Users/wiggles/nix/tests/functional/lang/eval-fail-assert.nix:2:12:
1| let {
2| x = arg: assert arg == "y"; 123;
| ^
3|
This includes position information in more places, making debugging
easier.
Before:
```
$ nix-instantiate --show-trace --eval tests/functional/lang/eval-fail-using-set-as-attr-name.nix
error:
… while evaluating an attribute name
at «none»:0: (source not available)
error: value is a set while a string was expected
```
After:
```
error:
… while evaluating an attribute name
at /pwd/lang/eval-fail-using-set-as-attr-name.nix:5:10:
4| in
5| attr.${key}
| ^
6|
error: value is a set while a string was expected
```
