.. _bltin-exceptions:

Built-in Exceptions

.. index:: statement: try statement: except

In Python, all exceptions must be instances of a class that derives from :class:BaseException. In a :keyword:try statement with an :keyword:except clause that mentions a particular class, that clause also handles any exception classes derived from that class (but not exception classes from which it is derived). Two exception classes that are not related via subclassing are never equivalent, even if they have the same name.

.. index:: statement: raise

The built-in exceptions listed below can be generated by the interpreter or built-in functions. Except where mentioned, they have an "associated value" indicating the detailed cause of the error. This may be a string or a tuple of several items of information (e.g., an error code and a string explaining the code). The associated value is usually passed as arguments to the exception class's constructor.

User code can raise built-in exceptions. This can be used to test an exception handler or to report an error condition "just like" the situation in which the interpreter raises the same exception; but beware that there is nothing to prevent user code from raising an inappropriate error.

The built-in exception classes can be subclassed to define new exceptions; programmers are encouraged to derive new exceptions from the :exc:Exception class or one of its subclasses, and not from :exc:BaseException. More information on defining exceptions is available in the Python Tutorial under :ref:tut-userexceptions.

When raising (or re-raising) an exception in an :keyword:except or :keyword:finally clause :attr:__context__ is automatically set to the last exception caught; if the new exception is not handled the traceback that is eventually displayed will include the originating exception(s) and the final exception.

When raising a new exception (rather than using a bare raise to re-raise the exception currently being handled), the implicit exception context can be supplemented with an explicit cause by using :keyword:from with :keyword:raise::

raise new_exc from original_exc

The expression following :keyword:from must be an exception or None. It will be set as :attr:__cause__ on the raised exception. Setting :attr:__cause__ also implicitly sets the :attr:__suppress_context__ attribute to True, so that using raise new_exc from None effectively replaces the old exception with the new one for display purposes (e.g. converting :exc:KeyError to :exc:AttributeError), while leaving the old exception available in :attr:__context__ for introspection when debugging.

The default traceback display code shows these chained exceptions in addition to the traceback for the exception itself. An explicitly chained exception in :attr:__cause__ is always shown when present. An implicitly chained exception in :attr:__context__ is shown only if :attr:__cause__ is :const:None and :attr:__suppress_context__ is false.

In either case, the exception itself is always shown after any chained exceptions so that the final line of the traceback always shows the last exception that was raised.

Base classes

The following exceptions are used mostly as base classes for other exceptions.

.. exception:: BaseException

The base class for all built-in exceptions. It is not meant to be directly inherited by user-defined classes (for that, use :exc:Exception). If :func:str is called on an instance of this class, the representation of the argument(s) to the instance are returned, or the empty string when there were no arguments.

.. attribute:: args

  The tuple of arguments given to the exception constructor.  Some built-in
  exceptions (like :exc:`OSError`) expect a certain number of arguments and
  assign a special meaning to the elements of this tuple, while others are
  usually called only with a single string giving an error message.

.. method:: with_traceback(tb)

  This method sets *tb* as the new traceback for the exception and returns
  the exception object.  It is usually used in exception handling code like
  this::

     try:
         ...
     except SomeException:
         tb = sys.exc_info()[2]
         raise OtherException(...).with_traceback(tb)

.. exception:: Exception

All built-in, non-system-exiting exceptions are derived from this class. All user-defined exceptions should also be derived from this class.

.. exception:: ArithmeticError

The base class for those built-in exceptions that are raised for various arithmetic errors: :exc:OverflowError, :exc:ZeroDivisionError, :exc:FloatingPointError.

.. exception:: BufferError

Raised when a :ref:buffer <bufferobjects> related operation cannot be performed.

.. exception:: LookupError

The base class for the exceptions that are raised when a key or index used on a mapping or sequence is invalid: :exc:IndexError, :exc:KeyError. This can be raised directly by :func:codecs.lookup.

Concrete exceptions

The following exceptions are the exceptions that are usually raised.

.. exception:: AssertionError

.. index:: statement: assert

Raised when an :keyword:assert statement fails.

.. exception:: AttributeError

Raised when an attribute reference (see :ref:attribute-references) or assignment fails. (When an object does not support attribute references or attribute assignments at all, :exc:TypeError is raised.)

.. exception:: EOFError

Raised when the :func:input function hits an end-of-file condition (EOF) without reading any data. (N.B.: the :meth:io.IOBase.read and :meth:io.IOBase.readline methods return an empty string when they hit EOF.)

.. exception:: FloatingPointError

Not currently used.

.. exception:: GeneratorExit

Raised when a :term:generator or :term:coroutine is closed; see :meth:generator.close and :meth:coroutine.close. It directly inherits from :exc:BaseException instead of :exc:Exception since it is technically not an error.

.. exception:: ImportError

Raised when the :keyword:import statement has troubles trying to load a module. Also raised when the "from list" in from ... import has a name that cannot be found.

The :attr:name and :attr:path attributes can be set using keyword-only arguments to the constructor. When set they represent the name of the module that was attempted to be imported and the path to any file which triggered the exception, respectively.

.. versionchanged:: 3.3 Added the :attr:name and :attr:path attributes.

.. exception:: ModuleNotFoundError

A subclass of :exc:ImportError which is raised by :keyword:import when a module could not be located. It is also raised when None is found in :data:sys.modules.

.. versionadded:: 3.6

.. exception:: IndexError

Raised when a sequence subscript is out of range. (Slice indices are silently truncated to fall in the allowed range; if an index is not an integer, :exc:TypeError is raised.)

.. XXX xref to sequences

.. exception:: KeyError

Raised when a mapping (dictionary) key is not found in the set of existing keys.

.. XXX xref to mapping objects?

.. exception:: KeyboardInterrupt

Raised when the user hits the interrupt key (normally :kbd:Control-C or :kbd:Delete). During execution, a check for interrupts is made regularly. The exception inherits from :exc:BaseException so as to not be accidentally caught by code that catches :exc:Exception and thus prevent the interpreter from exiting.

.. exception:: MemoryError

Raised when an operation runs out of memory but the situation may still be rescued (by deleting some objects). The associated value is a string indicating what kind of (internal) operation ran out of memory. Note that because of the underlying memory management architecture (C's :c:func:malloc function), the interpreter may not always be able to completely recover from this situation; it nevertheless raises an exception so that a stack traceback can be printed, in case a run-away program was the cause.

.. exception:: NameError

Raised when a local or global name is not found. This applies only to unqualified names. The associated value is an error message that includes the name that could not be found.

.. exception:: NotImplementedError

This exception is derived from :exc:RuntimeError. In user defined base classes, abstract methods should raise this exception when they require derived classes to override the method, or while the class is being developed to indicate that the real implementation still needs to be added.

.. note::

  It should not be used to indicate that an operator or method is not
  meant to be supported at all -- in that case either leave the operator /
  method undefined or, if a subclass, set it to :data:`None`.

.. note::

  ``NotImplementedError`` and ``NotImplemented`` are not interchangeable,
  even though they have similar names and purposes.  See
  :data:`NotImplemented` for details on when to use it.

.. exception:: OSError([arg]) OSError(errno, strerror[, filename[, winerror[, filename2]]])

.. index:: module: errno

This exception is raised when a system function returns a system-related error, including I/O failures such as "file not found" or "disk full" (not for illegal argument types or other incidental errors).

The second form of the constructor sets the corresponding attributes, described below. The attributes default to :const:None if not specified. For backwards compatibility, if three arguments are passed, the :attr:~BaseException.args attribute contains only a 2-tuple of the first two constructor arguments.

The constructor often actually returns a subclass of :exc:OSError, as described in OS exceptions_ below. The particular subclass depends on the final :attr:.errno value. This behaviour only occurs when constructing :exc:OSError directly or via an alias, and is not inherited when subclassing.

.. attribute:: errno

  A numeric error code from the C variable :c:data:`errno`.

.. attribute:: winerror

  Under Windows, this gives you the native
  Windows error code.  The :attr:`.errno` attribute is then an approximate
  translation, in POSIX terms, of that native error code.

  Under Windows, if the *winerror* constructor argument is an integer,
  the :attr:`.errno` attribute is determined from the Windows error code,
  and the *errno* argument is ignored.  On other platforms, the
  *winerror* argument is ignored, and the :attr:`winerror` attribute
  does not exist.

.. attribute:: strerror

  The corresponding error message, as provided by
  the operating system.  It is formatted by the C
  functions :c:func:`perror` under POSIX, and :c:func:`FormatMessage`
  under Windows.

.. attribute:: filename filename2

  For exceptions that involve a file system path (such as :func:`open` or
  :func:`os.unlink`), :attr:`filename` is the file name passed to the function.
  For functions that involve two file system paths (such as
  :func:`os.rename`), :attr:`filename2` corresponds to the second
  file name passed to the function.

.. versionchanged:: 3.3 :exc:EnvironmentError, :exc:IOError, :exc:WindowsError, :exc:socket.error, :exc:select.error and :exc:mmap.error have been merged into :exc:OSError, and the constructor may return a subclass.

.. versionchanged:: 3.4 The :attr:filename attribute is now the original file name passed to the function, instead of the name encoded to or decoded from the filesystem encoding. Also, the filename2 constructor argument and attribute was added.

.. exception:: OverflowError

Raised when the result of an arithmetic operation is too large to be represented. This cannot occur for integers (which would rather raise :exc:MemoryError than give up). However, for historical reasons, OverflowError is sometimes raised for integers that are outside a required range. Because of the lack of standardization of floating point exception handling in C, most floating point operations are not checked.

.. exception:: RecursionError

This exception is derived from :exc:RuntimeError. It is raised when the interpreter detects that the maximum recursion depth (see :func:sys.getrecursionlimit) is exceeded.

.. versionadded:: 3.5 Previously, a plain :exc:RuntimeError was raised.

.. exception:: ReferenceError

This exception is raised when a weak reference proxy, created by the :func:weakref.proxy function, is used to access an attribute of the referent after it has been garbage collected. For more information on weak references, see the :mod:weakref module.

.. exception:: RuntimeError

Raised when an error is detected that doesn't fall in any of the other categories. The associated value is a string indicating what precisely went wrong.

.. exception:: StopIteration

Raised by built-in function :func:next and an :term:iterator's :meth:~iterator.__next__ method to signal that there are no further items produced by the iterator.

The exception object has a single attribute :attr:value, which is given as an argument when constructing the exception, and defaults to :const:None.

When a :term:generator or :term:coroutine function returns, a new :exc:StopIteration instance is raised, and the value returned by the function is used as the :attr:value parameter to the constructor of the exception.

If a generator code directly or indirectly raises :exc:StopIteration, it is converted into a :exc:RuntimeError (retaining the :exc:StopIteration as the new exception's cause).

.. versionchanged:: 3.3 Added value attribute and the ability for generator functions to use it to return a value.

.. versionchanged:: 3.5 Introduced the RuntimeError transformation via from __future__ import generator_stop, see :pep:479.

.. versionchanged:: 3.7 Enable :pep:479 for all code by default: a :exc:StopIteration error raised in a generator is transformed into a :exc:RuntimeError.

.. exception:: StopAsyncIteration

Must be raised by :meth:__anext__ method of an :term:asynchronous iterator object to stop the iteration.

.. versionadded:: 3.5

.. exception:: SyntaxError

Raised when the parser encounters a syntax error. This may occur in an :keyword:import statement, in a call to the built-in functions :func:exec or :func:eval, or when reading the initial script or standard input (also interactively).

Instances of this class have attributes :attr:filename, :attr:lineno, :attr:offset and :attr:text for easier access to the details. :func:str of the exception instance returns only the message.

.. exception:: IndentationError

Base class for syntax errors related to incorrect indentation. This is a subclass of :exc:SyntaxError.

.. exception:: TabError

Raised when indentation contains an inconsistent use of tabs and spaces. This is a subclass of :exc:IndentationError.

.. exception:: SystemError

Raised when the interpreter finds an internal error, but the situation does not look so serious to cause it to abandon all hope. The associated value is a string indicating what went wrong (in low-level terms).

You should report this to the author or maintainer of your Python interpreter. Be sure to report the version of the Python interpreter (sys.version; it is also printed at the start of an interactive Python session), the exact error message (the exception's associated value) and if possible the source of the program that triggered the error.

.. exception:: SystemExit

This exception is raised by the :func:sys.exit function. It inherits from :exc:BaseException instead of :exc:Exception so that it is not accidentally caught by code that catches :exc:Exception. This allows the exception to properly propagate up and cause the interpreter to exit. When it is not handled, the Python interpreter exits; no stack traceback is printed. The constructor accepts the same optional argument passed to :func:sys.exit. If the value is an integer, it specifies the system exit status (passed to C's :c:func:exit function); if it is None, the exit status is zero; if it has another type (such as a string), the object's value is printed and the exit status is one.

A call to :func:sys.exit is translated into an exception so that clean-up handlers (:keyword:finally clauses of :keyword:try statements) can be executed, and so that a debugger can execute a script without running the risk of losing control. The :func:os._exit function can be used if it is absolutely positively necessary to exit immediately (for example, in the child process after a call to :func:os.fork).

.. attribute:: code

  The exit status or error message that is passed to the constructor.
  (Defaults to ``None``.)

.. exception:: TypeError

Raised when an operation or function is applied to an object of inappropriate type. The associated value is a string giving details about the type mismatch.

This exception may be raised by user code to indicate that an attempted operation on an object is not supported, and is not meant to be. If an object is meant to support a given operation but has not yet provided an implementation, :exc:NotImplementedError is the proper exception to raise.

Passing arguments of the wrong type (e.g. passing a :class:list when an :class:int is expected) should result in a :exc:TypeError, but passing arguments with the wrong value (e.g. a number outside expected boundaries) should result in a :exc:ValueError.

.. exception:: UnboundLocalError

Raised when a reference is made to a local variable in a function or method, but no value has been bound to that variable. This is a subclass of :exc:NameError.

.. exception:: UnicodeError

Raised when a Unicode-related encoding or decoding error occurs. It is a subclass of :exc:ValueError.

:exc:UnicodeError has attributes that describe the encoding or decoding error. For example, err.object[err.start:err.end] gives the particular invalid input that the codec failed on.

.. attribute:: encoding

   The name of the encoding that raised the error.

.. attribute:: reason

   A string describing the specific codec error.

.. attribute:: object

   The object the codec was attempting to encode or decode.

.. attribute:: start

   The first index of invalid data in :attr:`object`.

.. attribute:: end

   The index after the last invalid data in :attr:`object`.

.. exception:: UnicodeEncodeError

Raised when a Unicode-related error occurs during encoding. It is a subclass of :exc:UnicodeError.

.. exception:: UnicodeDecodeError

Raised when a Unicode-related error occurs during decoding. It is a subclass of :exc:UnicodeError.

.. exception:: UnicodeTranslateError

Raised when a Unicode-related error occurs during translating. It is a subclass of :exc:UnicodeError.

.. exception:: ValueError

Raised when an operation or function receives an argument that has the right type but an inappropriate value, and the situation is not described by a more precise exception such as :exc:IndexError.

.. exception:: ZeroDivisionError

Raised when the second argument of a division or modulo operation is zero. The associated value is a string indicating the type of the operands and the operation.

The following exceptions are kept for compatibility with previous versions; starting from Python 3.3, they are aliases of :exc:OSError.

.. exception:: EnvironmentError

.. exception:: IOError

.. exception:: WindowsError

Only available on Windows.

OS exceptions ^^^^^^^^^^^^^

The following exceptions are subclasses of :exc:OSError, they get raised depending on the system error code.

.. exception:: BlockingIOError

Raised when an operation would block on an object (e.g. socket) set for non-blocking operation. Corresponds to :c:data:errno EAGAIN, EALREADY, EWOULDBLOCK and EINPROGRESS.

In addition to those of :exc:OSError, :exc:BlockingIOError can have one more attribute:

.. attribute:: characters_written

  An integer containing the number of characters written to the stream
  before it blocked.  This attribute is available when using the
  buffered I/O classes from the :mod:`io` module.

.. exception:: ChildProcessError

Raised when an operation on a child process failed. Corresponds to :c:data:errno ECHILD.

.. exception:: ConnectionError

A base class for connection-related issues.

Subclasses are :exc:BrokenPipeError, :exc:ConnectionAbortedError, :exc:ConnectionRefusedError and :exc:ConnectionResetError.

.. exception:: BrokenPipeError

A subclass of :exc:ConnectionError, raised when trying to write on a pipe while the other end has been closed, or trying to write on a socket which has been shutdown for writing. Corresponds to :c:data:errno EPIPE and ESHUTDOWN.

.. exception:: ConnectionAbortedError

A subclass of :exc:ConnectionError, raised when a connection attempt is aborted by the peer. Corresponds to :c:data:errno ECONNABORTED.

.. exception:: ConnectionRefusedError

A subclass of :exc:ConnectionError, raised when a connection attempt is refused by the peer. Corresponds to :c:data:errno ECONNREFUSED.

.. exception:: ConnectionResetError

A subclass of :exc:ConnectionError, raised when a connection is reset by the peer. Corresponds to :c:data:errno ECONNRESET.

.. exception:: FileExistsError

Raised when trying to create a file or directory which already exists. Corresponds to :c:data:errno EEXIST.

.. exception:: FileNotFoundError

Raised when a file or directory is requested but doesn't exist. Corresponds to :c:data:errno ENOENT.

.. exception:: InterruptedError

Raised when a system call is interrupted by an incoming signal. Corresponds to :c:data:errno :py:data:~errno.EINTR.

.. versionchanged:: 3.5 Python now retries system calls when a syscall is interrupted by a signal, except if the signal handler raises an exception (see :pep:475 for the rationale), instead of raising :exc:InterruptedError.

.. exception:: IsADirectoryError

Raised when a file operation (such as :func:os.remove) is requested on a directory. Corresponds to :c:data:errno EISDIR.

.. exception:: NotADirectoryError

Raised when a directory operation (such as :func:os.listdir) is requested on something which is not a directory. Corresponds to :c:data:errno ENOTDIR.

.. exception:: PermissionError

Raised when trying to run an operation without the adequate access rights - for example filesystem permissions. Corresponds to :c:data:errno EACCES and EPERM.

.. exception:: ProcessLookupError

Raised when a given process doesn't exist. Corresponds to :c:data:errno ESRCH.

.. exception:: TimeoutError

Raised when a system function timed out at the system level. Corresponds to :c:data:errno ETIMEDOUT.

.. versionadded:: 3.3 All the above :exc:OSError subclasses were added.

.. seealso::

:pep:3151 - Reworking the OS and IO exception hierarchy

.. _warning-categories-as-exceptions:

Warnings

The following exceptions are used as warning categories; see the :ref:warning-categories documentation for more details.

.. exception:: Warning

Base class for warning categories.

.. exception:: UserWarning

Base class for warnings generated by user code.

.. exception:: DeprecationWarning

Base class for warnings about deprecated features when those warnings are intended for other Python developers.

.. exception:: PendingDeprecationWarning

Base class for warnings about features which will be deprecated in the future.

.. exception:: SyntaxWarning

Base class for warnings about dubious syntax.

.. exception:: RuntimeWarning

Base class for warnings about dubious runtime behavior.

.. exception:: FutureWarning

Base class for warnings about deprecated features when those warnings are intended for end users of applications that are written in Python.

.. exception:: ImportWarning

Base class for warnings about probable mistakes in module imports.

.. exception:: UnicodeWarning

Base class for warnings related to Unicode.

.. exception:: BytesWarning

Base class for warnings related to :class:bytes and :class:bytearray.

.. exception:: ResourceWarning

Base class for warnings related to resource usage. Ignored by the default warning filters.

.. versionadded:: 3.2

Exception hierarchy

The class hierarchy for built-in exceptions is:

.. literalinclude:: ../../Lib/test/exception_hierarchy.txt