Measuring exception handling overhead in C++

Question

What is the best way to measure exception handling overhead/performance in C++?

Please give standalone code samples.

I'm targeting Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 and gcc.

I need to get results from the following cases:

1. Overhead when there are no try/catch blocks
2. Overhead when there are try/catch blocks but exceptions are not thrown
3. Overhead when exceptions are thrown

Answer 1

As a suggestion: don't bother too much with the overhead when exceptions are thrown. Exception handling implementations usually make not throwing fast and catching slow. That's ok since those cases are, well, exceptional.

Carl

Answer 2

Section 5.4 of the draft Technical Report on C++ Performance is entirely devoted to the overhead of exceptions.