thistermination is a library crate inspired by thiserror to add the std::process::Termination trait to error enums.

[dependencies]
thistermination = "1.0"

Compiler support: requires rustc 1.56+

A struct or enum that implements the std::process::Termination and std::fmt::Debug traits can be returned by the main function, allowing developers to print a message on program exit and set the exit code.

To add the std::process::Termination trait to an enum, you can use one of three possible derive macros:

• #[derive(Termination)]: is intended to be used in combination with thiserror, this macro implements the traits std::process::Termination and std::fmt::Debug. The exit_code defaults to libc::EXIT_FAILURE, and the Debug message is the same as the Display message unless explicitly set using exit_code and msg.

  use thistermination::{Termination};
  use thiserror::Error;
  
  #[derive(Error, Termination)]
  pub enum RequestError {
      #[error("request failed {0:?}")]
      RequestFailed(#[from] reqwest::Error),
      #[termination(msg("exiting wrong api key"))]
      #[error("wrong api key")]
      WrongAPIKey,
      #[termination(exit_code(3))]
      #[error("failed with status {0}")]
      RequestStatusError(u16),
      #[termination(exit_code(4), msg("exiting failed to load image {error:?}"))]
      #[error("failed to load image {error:?}")]
      ImageLoadError{#[from] error: image::ImageError},
  }
  
  fn main() -> Result<(), RequestError> {
      Err(RequestError::WrongAPIKey)
  }

• #[derive(TerminationFull)]: is intended to be used without thiserror, this macro implements the traits std::process::Termination, std::fmt::Debug, std::fmt::Display, and std::error::Error. The exit_code defaults to libc::EXIT_FAILURE, and msg is required and used for both Display and Debug.

  use thistermination::{TerminationFull};
  
  #[derive(TerminationFull)]
  pub enum RequestError {
      #[termination(exit_code(1), msg("request failed {0:?}"))]
      RequestFailed(#[from] reqwest::Error),
      #[termination(exit_code(2), msg("wrong api key"))]
      WrongAPIKey,
      #[termination(exit_code(3), msg("failed with status {0}"))]
      RequestStatusError(u16),
      #[termination(exit_code(4), msg("failed to load image {error:?}"))]
      ImageLoadError{#[from] error: image::ImageError},
  }
  
  fn main() -> Result<(), RequestError> {
      Err(RequestError::WrongAPIKey)
  }

• #[derive(TerminationNoDebug)]: is the most basic variant, implementing only the std::process::Termination trait. If no exit_code is provided, it defaults to libc::EXIT_FAILURE. However, the std::fmt::Debug trait is necessary for the enum to be returned by the main function and must be implemented manually or using the Debug macro.

  use thistermination::{TerminationNoDebug};
  
  #[derive(TerminationNoDebug, Debug)]
  pub enum RequestError {
      #[termination(exit_code(1))]
      RequestFailed(reqwest::Error),
      WrongAPIKey,
      #[termination(exit_code(3))]
      RequestStatusError(u16),
      ImageLoadError{error: image::ImageError},
  }
  
  fn main() -> Result<(), RequestError> {
      Err(RequestError::WrongAPIKey)
  }

• thistermination does not appear in your public API; the macros simply implement the the various traits.

• The macros can be derived for unit enums, enums with named fields, and enum tuples.

• msg supports accessing the fields of the enum in a format string manner

  • #[termination(msg("{var}"))] ⟶ write!("{}", self.var)
  • #[termination(msg("{0}"))] ⟶ write!("{}", self.0)
  • #[termination(msg("{var:?}"))] ⟶ write!("{:?}", self.var)
  • #[termination(msg("{0:?}"))] ⟶ write!("{:?}", self.0)

  You can also specify additional format string arguments for msg

  #[derive(TerminationFull)]
  pub enum RequestError {
      #[termination(exit_code(4), msg("failed to load image {0:?}"))]
      ImageLoadError(#[from] image::ImageError),
  }

• Using #[from] will generate a std::convert::From implementation for the specific variant. A variant with #[from] is not allowed to contain any additional fields and can only be used in combination with #[derive(TerminationFull)].

  #[derive(TerminationFull)]
  pub enum CLIError {
      #[termination(exit_code(4), msg("Invalid argument {0}, expected < {}", i16::MAX))]
      InvalidArgument(u16),
  }

• You can also change the default values of exit_code and msg by adding the #[termination(...)] helper attribute to the enum itself.

  #[derive(Error, Termination)]
  #[termination(exit_code(3), msg("Fatal Error"))]
  pub enum RequestError {
      #[error("request failed {0:?}")]
      RequestFailed(#[from] reqwest::Error),
      #[error("wrong api key")]
      WrongAPIKey,
      #[error("failed with status {0}")]
      RequestStatusError(u16),
      #[termination(exit_code(4), msg("exiting failed to load image {error:?}"))]
      #[error("failed to load image {error:?}")]
      ImageLoadError{#[from] error: image::ImageError},
  }

#[derive(TerminationFull)] can be used instead of thiserror as it offers many of the basic features of thiserror. However, it lacks some features like #[source], #[backtrace], the ability to automatically detect a backtrace, and #[error(transparent)]. If any of these features are required, you can use thiserror in combination with #[derive(Termination)].