Passes a list of arguments to a specified function and traps any exceptions
Supported Platforms: Windows and Mac OS
(vl-catch-all-apply 'function list)
Type: Symbol
A function. The function argument can be either a symbol identifying a defun or lambda expression.
Type: List
A list containing arguments to be passed to the function.
Type: Integer, Real, String, List, Ename (entity name), T, nil, or catch-all-apply-error
The result of the function call, if successful. If an error occurs, vl-catch-all-apply returns an error object.
If the function invoked by vl-catch-all-apply completes successfully, it is the same as using apply, as the following examples show:
(setq catchit (apply '/ '(50 5))) 10 (setq catchit (vl-catch-all-apply '/ '(50 5))) 10
The benefit of using vl-catch-all-apply is that it allows you to intercept errors and continue processing. See what happens when you try to divide by zero using apply:
(setq catchit (apply '/ '(50 0))) ; error: divide by zero
When you use apply, an exception occurs and an error message displays. Here is the same operation using vl-catch-all-apply:
(setq catchit (vl-catch-all-apply '/ '(50 0))) #<%catch-all-apply-error%>
The vl-catch-all-apply function traps the error and returns an error object. Use vl-catch-all-error-message to see the error message contained in the error object:
(vl-catch-all-error-message catchit) "divide by zero"