[erlang-questions] Cryptic error messages

[Michael McDaniel]

On Wed, Mar 26, 2008 at 03:42:58PM -0500, Will.Irwin@REDACTED wrote:
> I am running 1:11b5 on Ubuntu (that's the latest version in Ubuntu's package
> management system, though I see there is a 1:12 out now).
> 
> I am getting really cryptic messages in response to any error that I make.
> 
> For example:
> 
> (ping@REDACTED)1> M = 5.
> 5
> (ping@REDACTED)2> M = 6.
> 
> =ERROR REPORT==== 26-Mar-2008::14:01:34 ===
> Error in process <0.37.0> on node 'ping@REDACTED' with exit value:
> {{badmatch,6},[{erl_eval,expr,3}]}
> 
> ** exited: {{badmatch,6},[{erl_eval,expr,3}]} **
> 
> Huh?
> 
> ... whereas from reading the Getting Started with Erlang tutorial, I was
> expecting a message like:
> 
> ** exception error: no match of right hand side value 6
> 
> Am I doing something wrong, or is this the way it is in the version I have?
> 
> (For my second day running Erlang, error messages like this are not exactly
> helping my learning curve Smile)
> 
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

$ erl
Erlang (BEAM) emulator version 5.6 [async-threads:0] [hipe] [kernel-poll:false]

=> reading /home/mmcdanie/.erlang
=> ** Found 0 name clashes in code paths 
Eshell V5.6  (abort with ^G)
1> 
1> M = 5 .
5
2> M = 6 .
** exception error: no match of right hand side value 6
3> init:stop().
ok
4> 
$ 


The new exception messages are in R12.

~Michael