Result (error) types

help
1

I'm trying to wrap my head around the proper way to think about Result.

I'm writing a client library that speaks to a server using a simple protocol. The client sends a command name (a simple string), followed by parameters (key/value pairs). The server processes the command and replies with a "Ok" or "Fail" followed by parameters (key/value pairs).

I represent both these "commands" and "replies" as:

struct MgmtCmd {
  cmd: String,
  params: HashMap<String, String>
}

I'm using async-std, and in order to be able to use the convenience operator ? together with async-std's IO functions the async functions returns io::Result.

I have a function send_mgmtcmd that performs a synchronous "send command and wait for and receive a reply" sequence.

What feels most natural to me is if a server failure occurs, then I return an Err with a custom error, but this is where it gets confusing to me. The io::Result is designed to return specifically library IO errors, no? I can't just return my own custom error enums from the same function, right?

It feels natural that my function that sends the command and receives the reply returns a Result<MgmtCmd>, but the way I understand it the typically-used io::Result is hard-coded to return an async-std io::Error type for it's Err(), no?

So let's say I'm writing a function that does mixed IO calles to a "std" library (whether it be actual std, async-std or tokio) and custom processing of data that may cause custom errors that are not "IO Errors" -- what should that function's return type be to be compatible with:

  • library IO errors
  • My own custom errors
  • The ? operator

Just generally looking for good resources on how to properly use Result with a mix/blend of error types from different libraries.

2

Note that std::result::Result can use any type as the error type, whereas std::io::Result is a type alias that hard-codes it to always use the io error type. The io Result in async-std is a reexport of the same type alias.

If you feel that some other error is more appropriate, you can simply use that. It's also quite common to create your own custom error type using an enum. Rust by example has an entry on this here, and the chapter in the rust book on handling errors with results may also interest you.