Warp wrote:
>   By the way, I honestly wonder what's the "proper" way of doing that
> in Java, given that Java has exceptions and no scope-bound lifetime of
> objects. 

try {
handle = open(...);
} finally {
if (handle != null) handle.close();
}

Even uglier because you obviously have to declare the handle outside the 
block, check to see if the assignment worked, etc.

 > Do you always have to follow file handle creation with a 'try'
> block to guard against exceptions? Or is there some other trick to make
> such code exception-safe?

try/finally is what you use for making code exception safe.

>   (I understand that in C# this is handled with a 'using' block, which
> automatically and immediately disposes of objects when the block is
> exited. Is that the proper way of making file handles exception-safe
> there?)

Yep. You're basically supposed to put anything with a "Dispose" method 
inside a using block. (Well, unless you're assigning it to something more 
global, etc.)  More elegant than Java, but certainly not elegant, especially 
since it's not always obvious what classes have a Dispose method without 
reading the documentation, so it's easy to miss something if you're working 
with a new library.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Serving Suggestion:
     "Don't serve this any more. It's awful."

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