As a software user I am frequently frustrated by "an error occurred" like failure messages. As a developer I know that the software *knows* exactly what failed, why, and exactly what it was doing at the time, but doesn't pass any of this information on.
Recently I developed some C++ where for the first time I was happy with the information reported in error cases. The key to happiness, it turned out, was to collect "context" with exceptions as they propogated (back) up the call chain.
I would love boost to provide an exception class/framework/something with this capability to encourage collection of context information, which would make problem diagnosis so much easier.
IIRC, there was discussion of a library to help getting callstact info etc a few months back, but can't quite remember what the result was. I have basic info on doing this in C++Builder on Windows (and use it in our software) and it could esaily be applied to VC++, but as for other platforms, I'm affraid I can't help.
For BCB, have a look at http://www.wischik.com/lu/programmer/index.html and look at the debugging aids section. This could also easily be applied to VC++ as well, but I haven't tried it under that. We use it to generate a callstack in an assert which can be very useful. You could also use it to look up the method name during an access violation or some other exception that can get thrown.
I have also had some success using a try...__except block to get the CONTEXT as you mentioned and produce a callstack from that, but usually the last few entries are missing. You can always fill in the last entry for the exception address, but I don't know how much you can trust the stack at that point because, as far as I know, it has started unwinding. I don't think windows keeps a copy of it with the exception record so you can walk it once the exception has been thrown.
Cheers
Russell
Perhaps I could relate some of my experience and put some ideas up for discussion?
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