C++Now 2019

Exception Handling is probably one of the most controversial features in C++, with many code bases outright banning them from the start, or only allowing their use in very specific cases. The reasons for this are often unclear and founded on premises that are not well understood.

In this talk, we will explain exception handling from the bottom up, taking a close look at what a compiler actually has to do to implement the mechanism. Instead of focusing on a specific implementation, we will approach the problem from a more abstract, language-design point of view, allowing us to explore the different approaches an implementation could choose. In the end, we will gain a deeper understanding for the problems associated with the feature and how they could be mitigated in the future by alternative language features like the proposed static exceptions.