In the web browser, we detected the first two possible errors by
checking the data: the number of command-line arguments, and the
length of the web address that the user types.
In the third case, when a web page couldn't be downloaded, the
problem is detected somewhere inside the method get_url in
the module Protocols.HTTP. The problem must then be reported
to the program that called get_url, and this is done with the
return value. The method get_url usually returns an
object with the data from the web page, but if it fails to retrieve
the web page, it returns zero (0):
web_page = Protocols.HTTP.get_url(this_url);
if(web_page == 0)
{
write(" Failed.\n");
return;
}
The value zero is just the normal integer 0, but it is used
in many contexts to mean "no value" or "there was a problem". Many of
the built-in methods in Pike return 0 if they fail to do what they are
supposed to do. Most Pike programmers use the same convention.
To work this way, the integer 0 has to be special. It can be stored
in a variable of any type, and it can be returned from any method.
Every new variable that you define will contain the value 0, until you
give it another value.
