Error traps let you intercept and deal with run-time errors, rather than having programs unceremoniously abort or ignore a fatal error, possibly causing loss of data.
There are three steps you must take to trap errors, as described in the following sections:
1. Set the error trap. Use the ON ERROR GOTO statement.
2. Write the error-handling routine. The error-handling routine receives control when an error occurs.
3. Exit the error-handling routine. You exit the error handler using the RESUME statement so execution can continue at an appropriate location in the code.
For example, here is a piece of code that fills an array with the filenames from a directory. This section will add complete Error Trapping to prevent run-time errors when the user chooses a directory that does not have any files or a drive that is not ready.
SUB GetFileNames(File() AS STRING)
DIM CurrentDir AS STRING
DIM fName AS STRING, Mask AS STRING
DIM X AS INTEGER
Mask = "*.*"
CurrentDir = CURDIR$
Path = AskUserForPath$()
fName = DIR$(RTRIM$(Path) + Mask)
IF LEN(fName) = 0 THEN EXIT SUB
X = 1
WHILE LEN(fName)
Files(X) = fName
fName = DIR$
INCR X
WEND
END SUB
See Also