traceback.format_exception() used to work properly with the 'arg' value passed to a tracing function set up via sys.settrace for an 'exception' event. In Python 3.x, this is no longer the case. Below you'll find what the attached test produces for a variety of interpreter versions.

If this is not intended to work, I would be much obliged for a hint on how to achieve the desired effect--i.e. get a formatted exception traceback for the exception tuple 'arg' passed to the trace function.

Thanks!

See also: https://github.com/inducer/pudb/issues/61

#####################################################
Python 2.7
#####################################################
ZZ call
ZZ line
ZZ line
ZZ exception
exception (<type 'exceptions.AttributeError'>, "'int' object has no attribute 'invalid'", <traceback object at 0x1951fc8>)
-------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "exc-bug.py", line 20, in f
    x.invalid
AttributeError: 'int' object has no attribute 'invalid'

-------------------------------
ZZ return
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "exc-bug.py", line 22, in <module>
    f()
  File "exc-bug.py", line 20, in f
    x.invalid
AttributeError: 'int' object has no attribute 'invalid'
ZZ call
ZZ call
#####################################################

#####################################################
Python 3.2
#####################################################
ZZ call
ZZ line
ZZ line
ZZ exception
exception (<class 'AttributeError'>, "'int' object has no attribute 'invalid'", <traceback object at 0x7f4cf42e5f80>)
-------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "exc-bug.py", line 22, in <module>
    f()
  File "exc-bug.py", line 20, in f
    x.invalid
  File "exc-bug.py", line 9, in trace
    print("".join(format_exception(*arg)))
  File "/usr/lib/python3.2/traceback.py", line 180, in format_exception
    for value, tb in values:
  File "/usr/lib/python3.2/traceback.py", line 122, in _iter_chain
    cause = exc.__cause__
AttributeError: 'str' object has no attribute '__cause__'
#####################################################

#####################################################
Python 3.3
#####################################################
ZZ call
ZZ line
ZZ line
ZZ exception
exception (<class 'AttributeError'>, "'int' object has no attribute 'invalid'", <traceback object at 0x7f47383acb00>)
-------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "exc-bug.py", line 22, in <module>
    f()
  File "exc-bug.py", line 20, in f
    x.invalid
  File "exc-bug.py", line 9, in trace
    print("".join(format_exception(*arg)))
  File "/usr/lib/python3.3/traceback.py", line 181, in format_exception
    for value, tb in values:
  File "/usr/lib/python3.3/traceback.py", line 122, in _iter_chain
    context = exc.__context__
AttributeError: 'str' object has no attribute '__context__'
#####################################################

It looks like a bug in the tracing machinery that has only been revealed by the changes to how tracebacks are interpreted in python3.  It should be a relatively simple fix, but I wonder if there is existing code that depends on the second argument getting turned into a string.

You can hack around the problem by creating a class to wrap around the arg[1] you get that has __cause__ and __context__ attributes, both set to none, and whose __str__ returns the original string.

The problem is caused by the new format_exception in Python's traceback.py file. It reads

def format_exception(etype, value, tb, limit=None, chain=True): 
  list = []
  if chain:
     values = _iter_chain(value, tb)
  else:
     values = [(value, tb)]
  for value, tb in values:
      if isinstance(value, str):

and then

def _iter_chain(exc, custom_tb=None, seen=None):
    if seen is None:
        seen = set()
    seen.add(exc)
    its = []
    context = exc.__context__

As you can see, the new keyword parameter chain is True by default. Thus, iter_chain is called by default.

And there you have context= exc.__context__.
Now, if value is an object of type str Python tries to access the __context__ field of an object of type str.

And this raises an attribute error.

In an application (pudb) I've used the fixed

exc_info= sys.exc_info()
....
format_exception(*exc_info,chain=not isinstance(exc_info[1],str))

So, why is the keyword parameter 'chain' True by default.
This causes the problem.

Because the second argument to format_traceback is supposed to be (is documented to be) an exception object.  The fact that it used to work anyway in Python2 if you passed a string was an accident of the implementation.  Likewise, settrace is documented to provide a value, not a string, so the fact that it provides a string is a bug.  That needs to be fixed.

(As to specifically why chain defaults to True, it defaults to having the same behavior as the normal exception machinery.)

Thanks for the suggestion. Since 3.2 and 3.3 will be with us for a while, I've implemented the workaround you've suggested. Works, too. :)

It seems that settrace works normally when an exception is raised in the python code with the raise keyword. If an exception is raised in the C code, settrace breaks as the C code passes all exceptions as strings. To fix this issue we just added a line to normalize the C exception within settrace. We included a regression test for this defect.

I paired on this with user bmac (http://bugs.python.org/user17692).

Thanks Ingrid and Mark.  The patch looks good; I put a couple of FYI comments on the review.

I'm pretty sure this patch is correct, but I'd like someone with more experience modifying the ceval loop to confirm, so I'm nosying Benjamin.

Thank you, r.david.murray. I have updated the patch with your suggestions included.

New changeset d18df4c90515 by R David Murray in branch '3.3':
#17413: make sure settrace funcs get passed exception instances for 'value'.
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/d18df4c90515

New changeset 6297fcddf912 by R David Murray in branch 'default':
Merge #17413: make sure settrace funcs get passed exception instances for 'value'.
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/6297fcddf912

Benjamin reviewed the patch and pointed out that the settrace state needed to be restored in the test, so I fixed that when I committed it.

Thanks Ingrid and Brendan.