Question

I have been programming for Android with decent success, but one thing I have noticed is that when I get NullPointerExceptions the stack trace is worthless. They are always of this format:

Thread [<1> main] (Suspended (exception NullPointerException))  
    ViewRoot.draw(boolean) line: 1431   
    ViewRoot.performTraversals() line: 1163 
    ViewRoot.handleMessage(Message) line: 1727  
    ViewRoot(Handler).dispatchMessage(Message) line: 99 
    Looper.loop() line: 123 
    ActivityThread.main(String[]) line: 4627    
    Method.invokeNative(Object, Object[], Class, Class[], Class, int, boolean) line: not available [native method]  
    Method.invoke(Object, Object...) line: 521  
    ZygoteInit$MethodAndArgsCaller.run() line: 868  
    ZygoteInit.main(String[]) line: 626 
    NativeStart.main(String[]) line: not available [native method]  

Usually stack traces tell you right where the code blew up, but I always seem to get the most generic one possible. Am I missing something obvious? Thanks.

Answer 1

If you are using Eclipse, look at LogCat in the DDMS or Debug perspectives. It will show you the stack trace of the exception itself and that of the code that caused it.