Cannot catch Laravel 4 exception - php

Question

I'm trying to catch a Laravel exception inside my library.
namespace Marsvin\Output\JoomlaZoo;
class Compiler
{
protected function compileItem($itemId, $item)
{
$boom = explode('_', $itemId);
$boom[0][0] = strtoupper($boom[0][0]);
$className = __NAMESPACE__."\\Compiler\\".$boom[0];
try {
$class = new $className(); // <-- This is line 38
} catch(\Symfony\Component\Debug\Exception\FatalErrorException $e) {
throw new \Exception('I\'m not being thrown!');
}
}
}
This it the exception I'm getting:
file: "C:\MAMP\htdocs\name\app\libraries\WebName\Output\JoomlaZoo\Compiler.php"
line: 38
message: "Class 'Marsvin\Output\JoomlaZoo\Compiler\Deas' not found"
type: "Symfony\Component\Debug\Exception\FatalErrorException"
The name of the class is voluntarily wrong.
Edit 1:
I noticed that if I throw an exception inside the try statement I can catch the exception:
try {
throw new \Exception('I\'d like to be thrown!');
} catch(\Exception $e) {
throw new \Exception('I\'m overriding the previous exception!'); // This is being thrown
}

Answer 1

The problem is that you're trying to catch a FatalErrorException in your class, but Laravel won't let a fatal error get back there; it terminates immediately. If your were trying to catch a different kind of exception, your code would work just fine.
You can catch and handle fatal errors with an App::fatal method in app/start/global.php, but that won't help you deal with the exception from within your library, or to handle it with any specificity. A better option would be to trigger a "catchable" exception (something from Illuminate, for instance), or to throw a custom one based on the condition that you are trying to check.
In your case, if your goal is to deal with undefined classes, here's what I would suggest:
try {
$className = 'BadClass';
if (!class_exists($className)) {
throw new \Exception('The class '.$className.' does not exist.');
}
// everything was A-OK...
$class = new $className();
} catch( Exception $e) {
// handle the error, and/or throw different exception
throw new \Exception($e->getMessage());
}