How to catch errors from the MATLAB applicationCompiler command

Question

I am using the command applicationCompiler -package harmonic_viewer.prj to compile a MATLAB program for distribution. Sometimes I miss a file and the application compiler throws an error. I would like to catch such errors and pass the error up to terminate a Windows batch script that compiles a number of programs.

It seems from the documentation that applicationCompiler does not return a pass/fail result. It does throw an error that appears in red in the MATLAB command window. I believe I should be able to catch the error in a try-catch-end block, but it does not work for me. Here is an example session

>> try
applicationCompiler -package harmonic_viewer.prj
catch me
disp('ac error')
end
Error: Caught exception when packaging project: C:\build_matlab\source\harmonic_viewer\harmonic_viewer.prj
com.mathworks.project.api.InvalidProjectException
File filteredunwrap.m from Files required for your application to run does not exist.
>> 

I expected the try-catch-end block to trap the error and print 'ac error'.

Can anyone see what I am doing wrong?

I am using MATLAB r2014a on 64 bit Windows 7.

Answer 1

The compilation is run on another thread - you know this by the fact you can interact with Matlab while the compilation is going on.

The way to fix this (its a bit of a hack) is to create a post build method which will read the command window and look for key words, namely "Package failed" or "package finished" or in your case "Error: Caught"

e.g.

clc
applicationCompiler -package yourProject.prj
cmdWinDoc = com.mathworks.mde.cmdwin.CmdWinDocument.getInstance;
% loop until condition found
while true
  pause ( 2 )
  myTxt = cmdWinDoc.getText(cmdWinDoc.getStartPosition.getOffset,cmdWinDoc.getLength);
  %
  if ~isempty ( strfind ( myTxt, 'Package finished' ) )
    fprintf ( 'Woo hoo - it worked!!! :)\n' );
    break
  end
  if ~isempty ( strfind ( myTxt, 'Package failed' ) )
    fprintf ( 'Uh oh - it failed!!! :)\n' );
    break
  end
end

Note: You should put a time limit check in the loop as well to capture an infinite loop situation...

You can of course extend this to search for the errors and keywords for your case.