In Java, what is the difference between catch a generic exception and a specific exception (eg. IOException?)

Question

Currently I\'m catching only generic exceptions, but i want change this to catch the specific exceptions, but what is the advantage of this?

Answer 1

If you have a block of code which can throw different exceptions, and you surround that with a general try {} catch {Exception e}, you won't know what exactly happened and how you should handle the error.