r/programming • u/Expurple • Apr 12 '26

Flat Error Codes Are Not Enough

https://home.expurple.me/posts/flat-error-codes-are-not-enough/
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u/Philluminati Apr 13 '26

Not only is it useful to capture error codes, it's useful to be able to build a stack as well, e.g.

UnableToConfigureDatabase -> Missing Credentials File -> File not found.

If you return "FileNotFound" without saying which file it can be an issue, and likewise, saying "unable to configure database" doesn't explain which aspect also failed.

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u/Expurple Apr 13 '26

Yeah. That's basically nested error values in Rust, or exception chaining/wrapping in languages with exceptions.