Uncatchable ChuckNorrisException

Question

Is it possible to construct a snippet of code in Java that would make a hypothetical java.lang.ChuckNorrisException uncatchable?

Thoughts that came to m

Answer 1

My answer is based on @jtahlborn's idea, but it's a fully working Java program, that can be packaged into a JAR file and even deployed to your favorite application server as a part of a web application.

First of all, let's define ChuckNorrisException class so that it doesn't crash JVM from the beginning (Chuck really loves crashing JVMs BTW :)

package chuck;

import java.io.PrintStream;
import java.io.PrintWriter;

public class ChuckNorrisException extends Exception {

    public ChuckNorrisException() {
    }

    @Override
    public Throwable getCause() {
        return null;
    }

    @Override
    public String getMessage() {
        return toString();
    }

    @Override
    public void printStackTrace(PrintWriter s) {
        super.printStackTrace(s);
    }

    @Override
    public void printStackTrace(PrintStream s) {
        super.printStackTrace(s);
    }
}

Now goes Expendables class to construct it:

package chuck;

import javassist.*;

public class Expendables {

    private static Class clz;

    public static ChuckNorrisException getChuck() {
        try {
            if (clz == null) {
                ClassPool pool = ClassPool.getDefault();
                CtClass cc = pool.get("chuck.ChuckNorrisException");
                cc.setSuperclass(pool.get("java.lang.Object"));
                clz = cc.toClass();
            }
            return (ChuckNorrisException)clz.newInstance();
        } catch (Exception ex) {
            throw new RuntimeException(ex);
        }
    }
}

And finally the Main class to kick some butt:

package chuck;

public class Main {

    public void roundhouseKick() throws Exception {
        throw Expendables.getChuck();
    }

    public void foo() {
        try {
            roundhouseKick();
        } catch (Throwable ex) {
            System.out.println("Caught " + ex.toString());
        }
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        try {
            System.out.println("before");
            new Main().foo();
            System.out.println("after");
        } finally {
            System.out.println("finally");
        }
    }
}

Compile and run it with following command:

java -Xverify:none -cp .: chuck.Main

You will get following output:

before
finally

No surprise - it's a roundhouse kick after all :)