Deriving Error Enums
The thiserror crate is a popular way to create an error enum like we did on the previous page:
use std::{fs, io}; use std::io::Read; use thiserror::Error; #[derive(Debug, Error)] enum ReadUsernameError { #[error("Could not read: {0}")] IoError(#[from] io::Error), #[error("Found no username in {0}")] EmptyUsername(String), } fn read_username(path: &str) -> Result<String, ReadUsernameError> { let mut username = String::with_capacity(100); fs::File::open(path)?.read_to_string(&mut username)?; if username.is_empty() { return Err(ReadUsernameError::EmptyUsername(String::from(path))); } Ok(username) } fn main() { //fs::write("config.dat", "").unwrap(); match read_username("config.dat") { Ok(username) => println!("Username: {username}"), Err(err) => println!("Error: {err}"), } }
thiserror
’s derive macro automatically implements std::error::Error
, and optionally Display
(if the #[error(...)]
attributes are provided) and From
(if the #[from]
attribute is added).
It also works for structs.
It doesn’t affect your public API, which makes it good for libraries.