# DP: Throw exception instead of aborting when out of memory

From: inaky@peloncho.fis.ucm.es
To: submit@bugs.debian.org
Subject: Bug#42622: libstdc++2.10-dev: stl_alloc.h: malloc_alloc out of memory handling abort()s instead of using exceptions
Date: Sat, 7 Aug 1999 04:31:58 +0200

Package: libstdc++2.10-dev
Version: 1:2.95-2
Severity: important

        Hi

        While coding some proof-of-concepts I've come around using a
vector<> of a big lot of elements. Wanted to push the limits and try
to recover possible failures. No way. The program was aborting on the
library's own. 

        That should not do. You want exceptions to be able to dictate
how the program should behave on error situations. The thing is at
stl_alloc.h, instead of throwing an exception on OOM, it was printing
the message "out of memory" to stderr and aborting. It is also
prepared for doing it via exceptions, so I think it should be the
default way.

        I think that behaviour should be made extensible to the whole
libstdc++ library, as as far as I know, exception support in GCC is
mature enough as to handle it [and I hope so :)]. That's the only way
to fully control a program's flow. Libraries should not dictate what
to do on error [I'm sure I'm not telling you anything new].

        The changes to make stl_alloc work ok with exceptions are:

--- libstdc++/stl/stl_alloc.h~	Fri May  7 12:13:28 1999
+++ libstdc++/stl/stl_alloc.h	Sat Aug  7 04:16:22 1999
@@ -38,7 +38,7 @@
 // The allocation primitives are intended to allocate individual objects,
 // not larger arenas as with the original STL allocators.
 
-#if 0
+#ifdef __STL_USE_EXCEPTIONS
 #   include <new>
 #   define __THROW_BAD_ALLOC throw bad_alloc()
 #elif !defined(__THROW_BAD_ALLOC)

        Thanks, anyway, for such nice packages for GCC & Co.

        Your happy Debian user,

-- System Information
Debian Release: potato
Kernel Version: Linux jovian 2.2.7 #1 mar ago 3 02:24:40 CEST 1999 i586 unknown

Versions of the packages libstdc++2.10-dev depends on:
ii  g++             2.95-2         The GNU C++ compiler.
ii  libc6-dev       2.1.2-0pre4    GNU C Library: Development libraries and hea
ii  libstdc++2.10   2.95-2         The GNU stdc++ library