Exception API

Exception definition

All the exceptions that can be thrown by the underlying Tango C++ API are available in the PyTango python module. Hence a user can catch one of the following exceptions:

When an exception is caught, the sys.exc_info() function returns a tuple of three values that give information about the exception that is currently being handled. The values returned are (type, value, traceback). Since most functions don’t need access to the traceback, the best solution is to use something like exctype, value = sys.exc_info()[:2] to extract only the exception type and value. If one of the Tango exceptions is caught, the exctype will be class name of the exception (DevFailed, .. etc) and the value a tuple of dictionary objects all of which containing the following kind of key-value pairs:

  • reason: a string describing the error type (more readable than the associated error code)
  • desc: a string describing in plain text the reason of the error.
  • origin: a string giving the name of the (C++ API) method which thrown the exception
  • severity: one of the strings WARN, ERR, PANIC giving severity level of the error.
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import PyTango

#  How to protect the script from exceptions raised by the Tango
try:
    # Get proxy on a non existing device should throw an exception
    device = DeviceProxy("non/existing/device")
except DevFailed as df:
    print("Failed to create proxy to non/existing/device:\n%s" % df)

Throwing exception in a device server

The C++ PyTango::Except class with its most important methods have been wrapped to Python. Therefore, in a Python device server, you have the following methods to throw, re-throw or print a Tango::DevFailed exception :

The following code is an example of a command method requesting a command on a sub-device and re-throwing the exception in case of:

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try:
    dev.command_inout("SubDevCommand")
except PyTango.DevFailed as df:
    PyTango.Except.re_throw_exception(df,
        "MyClass_CommandFailed",
        "Sub device command SubdevCommand failed",
        "Command()")
line 2:Send the command to the sub device in a try/catch block
line 4-6:Re-throw the exception and add a new level of information in the exception stack

Exception API

class PyTango.Except

Bases: Boost.Python.instance

A containner for the static methods:

  • throw_exception
  • re_throw_exception
  • print_exception
  • compare_exception
static print_error_stack(ex) → None
Print all the details of a TANGO error stack.
Parameters:
ex:(PyTango.DevErrorList) The error stack reference
static print_exception(ex) → None
Print all the details of a TANGO exception.
Parameters:
ex:(PyTango.DevFailed) The DevFailed exception
static re_throw_exception(ex, reason, desc, origin, sever=PyTango.ErrSeverity.ERR) → None
Re-throw a TANGO DevFailed exception with one more error. The exception is re-thrown with one more DevError object. A default value PyTango.ErrSeverity.ERR is defined for the new DevError severity field.
Parameters:
ex:(PyTango.DevFailed) The DevFailed exception
reason:(str) The exception DevError object reason field
desc:(str) The exception DevError object desc field
origin:(str) The exception DevError object origin field
sever:(PyTango.ErrSeverity) The exception DevError object severity field
Throws:

DevFailed

static throw_exception(reason, desc, origin, sever=PyTango.ErrSeverity.ERR) → None
Generate and throw a TANGO DevFailed exception. The exception is created with a single DevError object. A default value PyTango.ErrSeverity.ERR is defined for the DevError severity field.
Parameters:
reason:(str) The exception DevError object reason field
desc:(str) The exception DevError object desc field
origin:(str) The exception DevError object origin field
sever:(PyTango.ErrSeverity) The exception DevError object severity field
Throws:

DevFailed

static throw_python_exception(type, value, traceback) → None

Generate and throw a TANGO DevFailed exception. The exception is created with a single DevError object. A default value PyTango.ErrSeverity.ERR is defined for the DevError severity field.

The parameters are the same as the ones generates by a call to sys.exc_info().

Parameters:
type:(class) the exception type of the exception being handled
value:(object) exception parameter (its associated value or the second argument to raise, which is always a class instance if the exception type is a class object)
traceback:(traceback) traceback object
Throws:

DevFailed

New in PyTango 7.2.1

static to_dev_failed(exc_type, exc_value, traceback) → PyTango.DevFailed

Generate a TANGO DevFailed exception. The exception is created with a single DevError object. A default value PyTango.ErrSeverity.ERR is defined for the DevError severity field.

The parameters are the same as the ones generates by a call to sys.exc_info().

Parameters:
type:(class) the exception type of the exception being handled
value:(object) exception parameter (its associated value or the second argument to raise, which is always a class instance if the exception type is a class object)
traceback:(traceback) traceback object
Return:

(PyTango.DevFailed) a tango exception object

New in PyTango 7.2.1

class PyTango.DevError

Bases: Boost.Python.instance

Structure describing any error resulting from a command execution, or an attribute query, with following members:

  • reason : (str) reason
  • severity : (ErrSeverity) error severty (WARN, ERR, PANIC)
  • desc : (str) error description
  • origin : (str) Tango server method in which the error happened
exception PyTango.DevFailed

Bases: exceptions.Exception

exception PyTango.ConnectionFailed

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception is thrown when a problem occurs during the connection establishment between the application and the device. The API is stateless. This means that DeviceProxy constructors filter most of the exception except for cases described in the following table.

The desc DevError structure field allows a user to get more precise information. These informations are :

DB_DeviceNotDefined
The name of the device not defined in the database
API_CommandFailed
The device and command name
API_CantConnectToDevice
The device name
API_CorbaException
The name of the CORBA exception, its reason, its locality, its completed flag and its minor code
API_CantConnectToDatabase
The database server host and its port number
API_DeviceNotExported
The device name
exception PyTango.CommunicationFailed

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception is thrown when a communication problem is detected during the communication between the client application and the device server. It is a two levels Tango::DevError structure. In case of time-out, the DevError structures fields are:

Level Reason Desc Severity
0 API_CorbaException CORBA exception fields translated into a string ERR
1 API_DeviceTimedOut String with time-out value and device name ERR

For all other communication errors, the DevError structures fields are:

Level Reason Desc Severity
0 API_CorbaException CORBA exception fields translated into a string ERR
1 API_CommunicationFailed String with device, method, command/attribute name ERR
exception PyTango.WrongNameSyntax

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception has only one level of Tango::DevError structure. The possible value for the reason field are :

API_UnsupportedProtocol
This error occurs when trying to build a DeviceProxy or an AttributeProxy instance for a device with an unsupported protocol. Refer to the appendix on device naming syntax to get the list of supported database modifier
API_UnsupportedDBaseModifier
This error occurs when trying to build a DeviceProxy or an AttributeProxy instance for a device/attribute with a database modifier unsupported. Refer to the appendix on device naming syntax to get the list of supported database modifier
API_WrongDeviceNameSyntax
This error occurs for all the other error in device name syntax. It is thrown by the DeviceProxy class constructor.
API_WrongAttributeNameSyntax
This error occurs for all the other error in attribute name syntax. It is thrown by the AttributeProxy class constructor.
API_WrongWildcardUsage
This error occurs if there is a bad usage of the wildcard character
exception PyTango.NonDbDevice

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception has only one level of Tango::DevError structure. The reason field is set to API_NonDatabaseDevice. This exception is thrown by the API when using the DeviceProxy or AttributeProxy class database access for non-database device.
exception PyTango.WrongData

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception has only one level of Tango::DevError structure. The possible value for the reason field are :

API_EmptyDbDatum
This error occurs when trying to extract data from an empty DbDatum object
API_IncompatibleArgumentType
This error occurs when trying to extract data with a type different than the type used to send the data
API_EmptyDeviceAttribute
This error occurs when trying to extract data from an empty DeviceAttribute object
API_IncompatibleAttrArgumentType
This error occurs when trying to extract attribute data with a type different than the type used to send the data
API_EmptyDeviceData
This error occurs when trying to extract data from an empty DeviceData object
API_IncompatibleCmdArgumentType
This error occurs when trying to extract command data with a type different than the type used to send the data
exception PyTango.NonSupportedFeature

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception is thrown by the API layer when a request to a feature implemented in Tango device interface release n is requested for a device implementing Tango device interface n-x. There is one possible value for the reason field which is API_UnsupportedFeature.
exception PyTango.AsynCall

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception is thrown by the API layer when a the asynchronous model id badly used. This exception has only one level of Tango::DevError structure. The possible value for the reason field are :

API_BadAsynPollId
This error occurs when using an asynchronous request identifier which is not valid any more.
API_BadAsyn
This error occurs when trying to fire callback when no callback has been previously registered
API_BadAsynReqType
This error occurs when trying to get result of an asynchronous request with an asynchronous request identifier returned by a non-coherent asynchronous request (For instance, using the asynchronous request identifier returned by a command_inout_asynch() method with a read_attribute_reply() attribute).
exception PyTango.AsynReplyNotArrived

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception is thrown by the API layer when:

  • a request to get asynchronous reply is made and the reply is not yet arrived
  • a blocking wait with timeout for asynchronous reply is made and the timeout expired.

There is one possible value for the reason field which is API_AsynReplyNotArrived.

exception PyTango.EventSystemFailed

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception is thrown by the API layer when subscribing or unsubscribing from an event failed. This exception has only one level of Tango::DevError structure. The possible value for the reason field are :

API_NotificationServiceFailed
This error occurs when the subscribe_event() method failed trying to access the CORBA notification service
API_EventNotFound
This error occurs when you are using an incorrect event_id in the unsubscribe_event() method
API_InvalidArgs
This error occurs when NULL pointers are passed to the subscribe or unsubscribe event methods
API_MethodArgument
This error occurs when trying to subscribe to an event which has already been subsribed to
API_DSFailedRegisteringEvent
This error means that the device server to which the device belongs to failed when it tries to register the event. Most likely, it means that there is no event property defined
API_EventNotFound
Occurs when using a wrong event identifier in the unsubscribe_event method
exception PyTango.DeviceUnlocked

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

This exception is thrown by the API layer when a device locked by the process has been unlocked by an admin client. This exception has two levels of Tango::DevError structure. There is only possible value for the reason field which is

API_DeviceUnlocked
The device has been unlocked by another client (administration client)

The first level is the message reported by the Tango kernel from the server side. The second layer is added by the client API layer with informations on which API call generates the exception and device name.

exception PyTango.NotAllowed

Bases: PyTango.DevFailed

exception PyTango.NamedDevFailedList

Bases: Boost.Python.instance

This exception is only thrown by the DeviceProxy::write_attributes() method. In this case, it is necessary to have a new class of exception to transfer the error stack for several attribute(s) which failed during the writing. Therefore, this exception class contains for each attributes which failed :

  • The name of the attribute
  • Its index in the vector passed as argumen tof the write_attributes() method
  • The error stack