C++ coroutines: What happens if an exception occurs in my return_value?

Raymond

When I introduced a basic implementation of a promise type, I noted that the return_value method or return_void method is called when the coroutine performs a co_return. But what happens if the return_value or return_void method raises an exception?

void return_value(T const& v) const
{
    holder.set_result(v); // what if the copy constructor throws?
}

void unhandled_exception() const noexcept
{
    holder.set_exception(std::current_exception());
}

What if we take an exception trying to set the result, say because the copy constructor threw an exception? Do we have to catch the exception and convert it to a holder.set_exception?

void return_value(T const& v) const
{
    // Do I have to wrap the set_result?
    try {
        holder.set_result(v);
    } catch (...) {
        holder.set_exception(std::current_exception());
    }
}

Let’s go back and look at the transformation that the compiler performs when it generates a coroutine:

return_type MyCoroutine(args...)
{
    create coroutine state
    copy parameters to coroutine frame
    promise_type p;
    auto return_object = p.get_return_object();

    try {
        co_await p.initial_suspend(); // ¹
        coroutine function body
    } catch (...) {
        p.unhandled_exception();
    }
    co_await p.final_suspend();
    destruct promise p
    destruct parameters in coroutine frame
    destroy coroutine state
}

The return_value and return_void happen as part of the transformation of the co_return statement, and that is part of the section marked coroutine function body. Therefore, if an exception occurs during return_value or return_void, it is caught by the catch (...) and is delivered to unhandled_exception.

In other words, the compiler already wrapped your return_value and return_void functions inside a try/catch so you don’t have to.

Note however that there is no try/catch wrapped around the call to unhandled_exception, so that method should be careful not throw any exceptions.

Okay, so that was a brief digression on exceptions that occur when returning a value to the promise. Next time, we’ll look at another improvement to our coroutine promise implementation.