[issue39433] curses.setupterm can raise _curses.error

[Julien Palard]

New submission from Julien Palard <julien+python at palard.fr>:

Currently the curses module can raise some `_curses.error` exception directly inheriting `Exception`.

This make it non-trivial for a newcomer to catch (they think they need a `from _curses import error`, or an `except Exception`, but in fact `error` is imported, in `curses/__init__.py`, in an `_curses import *`).

The `curses.error` is documented, but it's not documented that `curses.setupterm` can raise it and what the user sees on the exception message is "_curses.error" not "curses.error".


Questions:

- Should we create a properly named curse.CurseException, inheriting from _curses.error, so people can slowly migrate to use a "properly" named exception class?
- Should we document that setupterm can raise it?
- Should we introduce a dedicated sphinx directive to document exceptions?

I know the third question opens a whole field of work in the doc, it's only an anecdote but a student of mine pointed out yesterday that the doc is *not* telling what `int()` raises when an invalid argument is given. It's obvious for "us", but not for everybody (Yes I can teach it, yes he can just try it, but I'm not behind everyone on earth learning Python, some are learning alone, and I also want them to succeed).

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components: Library (Lib)
messages: 360556
nosy: mdk
priority: normal
severity: normal
status: open
title: curses.setupterm can raise _curses.error
type: behavior

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Python tracker <report at bugs.python.org>
<https://bugs.python.org/issue39433>
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