[java] How can I throw CHECKED exceptions from inside Java 8 streams?

How can I throw CHECKED exceptions from inside Java 8 streams/lambdas?

In other words, I want to make code like this compile:

public List<Class> getClasses() throws ClassNotFoundException {     

    List<Class> classes = 
        Stream.of("java.lang.Object", "java.lang.Integer", "java.lang.String")
              .map(className -> Class.forName(className))
              .collect(Collectors.toList());                  
    return classes;
    }

This code does not compile, since the Class.forName() method above throws ClassNotFoundException, which is checked.

Please note I do NOT want to wrap the checked exception inside a runtime exception and throw the wrapped unchecked exception instead. I want to throw the checked exception itself, and without adding ugly try/catches to the stream.

This answer is similar to 17 but avoiding wrapper exception definition:

List test = new ArrayList();
        try {
            test.forEach(obj -> {

                //let say some functionality throws an exception
                try {
                    throw new IOException("test");
                }
                catch(Exception e) {
                    throw new RuntimeException(e);
                }
            });
        }
        catch (RuntimeException re) {
            if(re.getCause() instanceof IOException) {
                //do your logic for catching checked
            }
            else 
                throw re; // it might be that there is real runtime exception
        }

You can!

Extending @marcg 's UtilException and adding throw E where necessary: this way, the compiler will ask you to add throw clauses and everything's as if you could throw checked exceptions natively on java 8's streams.

Instructions: just copy/paste LambdaExceptionUtil in your IDE and then use it as shown in the below LambdaExceptionUtilTest.

public final class LambdaExceptionUtil {

    @FunctionalInterface
    public interface Consumer_WithExceptions<T, E extends Exception> {
        void accept(T t) throws E;
    }

    @FunctionalInterface
    public interface Function_WithExceptions<T, R, E extends Exception> {
        R apply(T t) throws E;
    }

    /**
     * .forEach(rethrowConsumer(name -> System.out.println(Class.forName(name))));
     */
    public static <T, E extends Exception> Consumer<T> rethrowConsumer(Consumer_WithExceptions<T, E> consumer) throws E {
        return t -> {
            try {
                consumer.accept(t);
            } catch (Exception exception) {
                throwActualException(exception);
            }
        };
    }

    /**
     * .map(rethrowFunction(name -> Class.forName(name))) or .map(rethrowFunction(Class::forName))
     */
    public static <T, R, E extends Exception> Function<T, R> rethrowFunction(Function_WithExceptions<T, R, E> function) throws E  {
        return t -> {
            try {
                return function.apply(t);
            } catch (Exception exception) {
                throwActualException(exception);
                return null;
            }
        };
    }

    @SuppressWarnings("unchecked")
    private static <E extends Exception> void throwActualException(Exception exception) throws E {
        throw (E) exception;
    }

}

Some test to show usage and behaviour:

public class LambdaExceptionUtilTest {

    @Test(expected = MyTestException.class)
    public void testConsumer() throws MyTestException {
        Stream.of((String)null).forEach(rethrowConsumer(s -> checkValue(s)));
    }

    private void checkValue(String value) throws MyTestException {
        if(value==null) {
            throw new MyTestException();
        }
    }

    private class MyTestException extends Exception { }

    @Test
    public void testConsumerRaisingExceptionInTheMiddle() {
        MyLongAccumulator accumulator = new MyLongAccumulator();
        try {
            Stream.of(2L, 3L, 4L, null, 5L).forEach(rethrowConsumer(s -> accumulator.add(s)));
            fail();
        } catch (MyTestException e) {
            assertEquals(9L, accumulator.acc);
        }
    }

    private class MyLongAccumulator {
        private long acc = 0;
        public void add(Long value) throws MyTestException {
            if(value==null) {
                throw new MyTestException();
            }
            acc += value;
        }
    }

    @Test
    public void testFunction() throws MyTestException {
        List<Integer> sizes = Stream.of("ciao", "hello").<Integer>map(rethrowFunction(s -> transform(s))).collect(toList());
        assertEquals(2, sizes.size());
        assertEquals(4, sizes.get(0).intValue());
        assertEquals(5, sizes.get(1).intValue());
    }

    private Integer transform(String value) throws MyTestException {
        if(value==null) {
            throw new MyTestException();
        }
        return value.length();
    }

    @Test(expected = MyTestException.class)
    public void testFunctionRaisingException() throws MyTestException {
        Stream.of("ciao", null, "hello").<Integer>map(rethrowFunction(s -> transform(s))).collect(toList());
    }

}

TL;DR Just use Lombok's @SneakyThrows.

Christian Hujer has already explained in detail why throwing checked exceptions from a stream is, strictly speaking, not possible due to Java's limitations.

Some other answers have explained tricks to get around the limitations of the language but still being able to fulfil the requirement of throwing "the checked exception itself, and without adding ugly try/catches to the stream", some of them requiring tens of additional lines of boilerplate.

I am going to highlight another option for doing this that IMHO is far cleaner than all the others: Lombok's @SneakyThrows. It has been mentioned in passing by other answers but was a bit buried under a lot of unnecessary detail.

The resulting code is as simple as:

public List<Class> getClasses() throws ClassNotFoundException {
    List<Class> classes =
        Stream.of("java.lang.Object", "java.lang.Integer", "java.lang.String")
                .map(className -> getClass(className))
                .collect(Collectors.toList());
    return classes;
}

@SneakyThrows                                 // <= this is the only new code
private Class<?> getClass(String className) {
    return Class.forName(className);
}

We just needed one Extract Method refactoring (done by the IDE) and one additional line for @SneakyThrows. The annotation takes care of adding all the boilerplate to make sure that you can throw your checked exception without wrapping it in a RuntimeException and without needing to declare it explicitly.

I think this approach is the right one:

public List<Class> getClasses() throws ClassNotFoundException {
    List<Class> classes;
    try {
        classes = Stream.of("java.lang.Object", "java.lang.Integer", "java.lang.String").map(className -> {
            try {
                return Class.forName(className);
            } catch (ClassNotFoundException e) {
                throw new UndeclaredThrowableException(e);
            }
        }).collect(Collectors.toList());
    } catch (UndeclaredThrowableException e) {
        if (e.getCause() instanceof ClassNotFoundException) {
            throw (ClassNotFoundException) e.getCause();
        } else {
            // this should never happen
            throw new IllegalStateException(e.getMessage(), e);
        }
    }
    return classes;
}

Wrapping the checked exception inside the Callable in a UndeclaredThrowableException (that’s the use case for this exception) and unwrapping it outside.

Yes, I find it ugly, and I would advise against using lambdas in this case and just fall back to a good old loop, unless you are working with a parallel stream and paralellization brings an objective benefit that justifies the unreadability of the code.

As many others have pointed out, there are solutions to this situation, and I hope one of them will make it into a future version of Java.

I agree with the comments above, in using Stream.map you are limited to implementing Function which doesn't throw Exceptions.

You could however create your own FunctionalInterface that throws as below..

@FunctionalInterface
public interface UseInstance<T, X extends Throwable> {
  void accept(T instance) throws X;
}

then implement it using Lambdas or references as shown below.

import java.io.FileWriter;
import java.io.IOException;

//lambda expressions and the execute around method (EAM) pattern to
//manage resources

public class FileWriterEAM  {
  private final FileWriter writer;

  private FileWriterEAM(final String fileName) throws IOException {
    writer = new FileWriter(fileName);
  }
  private void close() throws IOException {
    System.out.println("close called automatically...");
    writer.close();
  }
  public void writeStuff(final String message) throws IOException {
    writer.write(message);
  }
  //...

  public static void use(final String fileName, final UseInstance<FileWriterEAM, IOException> block) throws IOException {

    final FileWriterEAM writerEAM = new FileWriterEAM(fileName);    
    try {
      block.accept(writerEAM);
    } finally {
      writerEAM.close();
    }
  }

  public static void main(final String[] args) throws IOException {

    FileWriterEAM.use("eam.txt", writerEAM -> writerEAM.writeStuff("sweet"));

    FileWriterEAM.use("eam2.txt", writerEAM -> {
        writerEAM.writeStuff("how");
        writerEAM.writeStuff("sweet");      
      });

    FileWriterEAM.use("eam3.txt", FileWriterEAM::writeIt);     

  }


 void writeIt() throws IOException{
     this.writeStuff("How ");
     this.writeStuff("sweet ");
     this.writeStuff("it is");

 }

}

I use this kind of wrapping exception:

public class CheckedExceptionWrapper extends RuntimeException {
    ...
    public <T extends Exception> CheckedExceptionWrapper rethrow() throws T {
        throw (T) getCause();
    }
}

It will require handling these exceptions statically:

void method() throws IOException, ServletException {
    try { 
        list.stream().forEach(object -> {
            ...
            throw new CheckedExceptionWrapper(e);
            ...            
        });
    } catch (CheckedExceptionWrapper e){
        e.<IOException>rethrow();
        e.<ServletExcepion>rethrow();
    }
}

Try it online!

Though exception will be anyway re-thrown during first rethrow() call (oh, Java generics...), this way allows to get a strict statical definition of possible exceptions (requires to declare them in throws). And no instanceof or something is needed.

Probably, a better and more functional way is to wrap exceptions and propagate them further in the stream. Take a look at the Try type of Vavr for example.

Example:

interface CheckedFunction<I, O> {
    O apply(I i) throws Exception; }

static <I, O> Function<I, O> unchecked(CheckedFunction<I, O> f) {
    return i -> {
        try {
            return f.apply(i);
        } catch(Exception ex) {

            throw new RuntimeException(ex);
        }
    } }

fileNamesToRead.map(unchecked(file -> Files.readAllLines(file)))

OR

@SuppressWarnings("unchecked")
private static <T, E extends Exception> T throwUnchecked(Exception e) throws E {
    throw (E) e;
}

static <I, O> Function<I, O> unchecked(CheckedFunction<I, O> f) {
    return arg -> {
        try {
            return f.apply(arg);
        } catch(Exception ex) {
            return throwUnchecked(ex);
        }
    };
}

2nd implementation avoids wrapping the exception in a RuntimeException. throwUnchecked works because almost always all generic exceptions are treated as unchecked in java.

I wrote a library that extends the Stream API to allow you to throw checked exceptions. It uses Brian Goetz's trick.

Your code would become

public List<Class> getClasses() throws ClassNotFoundException {     
    Stream<String> classNames = 
        Stream.of("java.lang.Object", "java.lang.Integer", "java.lang.String");

    return ThrowingStream.of(classNames, ClassNotFoundException.class)
               .map(Class::forName)
               .collect(Collectors.toList());
}

The simple answer to your question is: You can't, at least not directly. And it's not your fault. Oracle messed it up. They cling on the concept of checked exceptions, but inconsistently forgot to take care of checked exceptions when designing the functional interfaces, streams, lambda etc. That's all grist to the mill of experts like Robert C. Martin who call checked exceptions a failed experiment.

In my opinion, this is a huge bug in the API and a minor bug in the language specification.

The bug in the API is that it provides no facility for forwarding checked exceptions where this actually would make an awful lot of sense for functional programming. As I will demonstrate below, such a facility would've been easily possible.

The bug in the language specification is that it does not allow a type parameter to infer a list of types instead of a single type as long as the type parameter is only used in situations where a list of types is permissable (throws clause).

Our expectation as Java programmers is that the following code should compile:

import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.stream.Stream;

public class CheckedStream {
    // List variant to demonstrate what we actually had before refactoring.
    public List<Class> getClasses(final List<String> names) throws ClassNotFoundException {
        final List<Class> classes = new ArrayList<>();
        for (final String name : names)
            classes.add(Class.forName(name));
        return classes;
    }

    // The Stream function which we want to compile.
    public Stream<Class> getClasses(final Stream<String> names) throws ClassNotFoundException {
        return names.map(Class::forName);
    }
}

However, it gives:

cher@armor1:~/playground/Java/checkedStream$ javac CheckedStream.java 
CheckedStream.java:13: error: incompatible thrown types ClassNotFoundException in method reference
        return names.map(Class::forName);
                         ^
1 error

The way in which the functional interfaces are defined currently prevents the Compiler from forwarding the exception - there is no declaration which would tell Stream.map() that if Function.apply() throws E, Stream.map() throws E as well.

What's missing is a declaration of a type parameter for passing through checked exceptions. The following code shows how such a pass-through type parameter actually could have been declared with the current syntax. Except for the special case in the marked line, which is a limit discussed below, this code compiles and behaves as expected.

import java.io.IOException;
interface Function<T, R, E extends Throwable> {
    // Declare you throw E, whatever that is.
    R apply(T t) throws E;
}   

interface Stream<T> {
    // Pass through E, whatever mapper defined for E.
    <R, E extends Throwable> Stream<R> map(Function<? super T, ? extends R, E> mapper) throws E;
}   

class Main {
    public static void main(final String... args) throws ClassNotFoundException {
        final Stream<String> s = null;

        // Works: E is ClassNotFoundException.
        s.map(Class::forName);

        // Works: E is RuntimeException (probably).
        s.map(Main::convertClass);

        // Works: E is ClassNotFoundException.
        s.map(Main::throwSome);

        // Doesn't work: E is Exception.
        s.map(Main::throwSomeMore);  // error: unreported exception Exception; must be caught or declared to be thrown
    }   

    public static Class convertClass(final String s) {
        return Main.class;
    }   

    static class FooException extends ClassNotFoundException {}

    static class BarException extends ClassNotFoundException {}

    public static Class throwSome(final String s) throws FooException, BarException {
        throw new FooException();
    }   

    public static Class throwSomeMore(final String s) throws ClassNotFoundException, IOException  {
        throw new FooException();
    }   
}   

In the case of throwSomeMore we would like to see IOException being missed, but it actually misses Exception.

This is not perfect because type inference seems to be looking for a single type, even in the case of exceptions. Because the type inference needs a single type, E needs to resolve to a common super of ClassNotFoundException and IOException, which is Exception.

A tweak to the definition of type inference is needed so that the compiler would look for multiple types if the type parameter is used where a list of types is permissible (throws clause). Then the exception type reported by the compiler would be as specific as the original throws declaration of the checked exceptions of the referenced method, not a single catch-all super type.

The bad news is that this means that Oracle messed it up. Certainly they won't break user-land code, but introducing exception type parameters to the existing functional interfaces would break compilation of all user-land code that uses these interfaces explicitly. They'll have to invent some new syntax sugar to fix this.

The even worse news is that this topic was already discussed by Brian Goetz in 2010 https://blogs.oracle.com/briangoetz/entry/exception_transparency_in_java (new link: http://mail.openjdk.java.net/pipermail/lambda-dev/2010-June/001484.html) but I'm informed that this investigation ultimately did not pan out, and that there is no current work at Oracle that I know of to mitigate the interactions between checked exceptions and lambdas.

Just use any one of NoException (my project), jOO?'s Unchecked, throwing-lambdas, Throwable interfaces, or Faux Pas.

// NoException
stream.map(Exceptions.sneak().function(Class::forName));

// jOO?
stream.map(Unchecked.function(Class::forName));

// throwing-lambdas
stream.map(Throwing.function(Class::forName).sneakyThrow());

// Throwable interfaces
stream.map(FunctionWithThrowable.aFunctionThatUnsafelyThrowsUnchecked(Class::forName));

// Faux Pas
stream.map(FauxPas.throwingFunction(Class::forName));

You can also write a wrapper method to wrap unchecked exceptions, and even enhance wrapper with additional parameter representing another functional interface (with the same return type R). In this case you can pass a function that would be executed and returned in case of exceptions. See example below:

private void run() {
    List<String> list = Stream.of(1, 2, 3, 4).map(wrapper(i ->
            String.valueOf(++i / 0), i -> String.valueOf(++i))).collect(Collectors.toList());
    System.out.println(list.toString());
}

private <T, R, E extends Exception> Function<T, R> wrapper(ThrowingFunction<T, R, E> function, 
Function<T, R> onException) {
    return i -> {
        try {
            return function.apply(i);
        } catch (ArithmeticException e) {
            System.out.println("Exception: " + i);
            return onException.apply(i);
        } catch (Exception e) {
            System.out.println("Other: " + i);
            return onException.apply(i);
        }
    };
}

@FunctionalInterface
interface ThrowingFunction<T, R, E extends Exception> {
    R apply(T t) throws E;
}

If you use Spring Framework you can use ReflectionUtils.rethrowRuntimeException(ex) described here https://docs.spring.io/spring/docs/5.2.8.RELEASE/javadoc-api/org/springframework/util/ReflectionUtils.html#rethrowRuntimeException-java.lang.Throwable- The beauty of this util method is that it re-throws exactly same exception but of Runtime type, so your catch block that expects exception of checked type will still catch it as intended.

Summarizing the comments above the advanced solution is to use a special wrapper for unchecked functions with builder like API which provides recovering, rethrowing and suppresing.

Stream.of("java.lang.Object", "java.lang.Integer", "java.lang.String")
          .map(Try.<String, Class<?>>safe(Class::forName)
                  .handle(System.out::println)
                  .unsafe())
          .collect(toList());

Code below demonstrates it for Consumer, Supplier and Function interfaces. It can be easly expanded. Some public keywords were removed for this example.

Class Try is the endpoint for client code. Safe methods may have unique name for each function type. CheckedConsumer, CheckedSupplier and CheckedFunction are checked analogs of lib functions which can be used independently of Try

CheckedBuilder is the interface for handling exceptions in some checked function. orTry allows execute another same type function if previous was failed. handle provides exception handling including exception type filtering. The order of handlers is important. Reduce methods unsafe and rethrow rethrows last exception in the execution chain. Reduce methods orElse and orElseGet return alternate value like Optional ones if all functions failed. Also there is method suppress. CheckedWrapper is the common implementation of CheckedBuilder.

final class Try {

    public static <T> CheckedBuilder<Supplier<T>, CheckedSupplier<T>, T> 
        safe(CheckedSupplier<T> supplier) {
        return new CheckedWrapper<>(supplier, 
                (current, next, handler, orResult) -> () -> {
            try { return current.get(); } catch (Exception ex) {
                handler.accept(ex);
                return next.isPresent() ? next.get().get() : orResult.apply(ex);
            }
        });
    }

    public static <T> Supplier<T> unsafe(CheckedSupplier<T> supplier) {
        return supplier;
    }

    public static <T> CheckedBuilder<Consumer<T>, CheckedConsumer<T>, Void> 
        safe(CheckedConsumer<T> consumer) {
        return new CheckedWrapper<>(consumer, 
                (current, next, handler, orResult) -> t -> {
            try { current.accept(t); } catch (Exception ex) {
                handler.accept(ex);
                if (next.isPresent()) {
                    next.get().accept(t);
                } else {
                    orResult.apply(ex);
                }
            }
        });
    }

    public static <T> Consumer<T> unsafe(CheckedConsumer<T> consumer) {
        return consumer;
    }

    public static <T, R> CheckedBuilder<Function<T, R>, CheckedFunction<T, R>, R> 
        safe(CheckedFunction<T, R> function) {
        return new CheckedWrapper<>(function, 
                (current, next, handler, orResult) -> t -> {
            try { return current.applyUnsafe(t); } catch (Exception ex) {
                handler.accept(ex);
                return next.isPresent() ? next.get().apply(t) : orResult.apply(ex);
            }
        });
    }

    public static <T, R> Function<T, R> unsafe(CheckedFunction<T, R> function) {
        return function;
    }

    @SuppressWarnings ("unchecked")
    static <T, E extends Throwable> T throwAsUnchecked(Throwable exception) throws E { 
        throw (E) exception; 
    }
}

@FunctionalInterface interface CheckedConsumer<T> extends Consumer<T> {
    void acceptUnsafe(T t) throws Exception;
    @Override default void accept(T t) {
        try { acceptUnsafe(t); } catch (Exception ex) {
            Try.throwAsUnchecked(ex);
        }
    }
}

@FunctionalInterface interface CheckedFunction<T, R> extends Function<T, R> {
    R applyUnsafe(T t) throws Exception;
    @Override default R apply(T t) {
        try { return applyUnsafe(t); } catch (Exception ex) {
            return Try.throwAsUnchecked(ex);
        }
    }
}

@FunctionalInterface interface CheckedSupplier<T> extends Supplier<T> {
    T getUnsafe() throws Exception;
    @Override default T get() {
        try { return getUnsafe(); } catch (Exception ex) {
            return Try.throwAsUnchecked(ex);
        }
    }
}

interface ReduceFunction<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> {
    TSafe wrap(TUnsafe current, Optional<TSafe> next, 
            Consumer<Throwable> handler, Function<Throwable, R> orResult);
}

interface CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> {
    CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> orTry(TUnsafe next);

    CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> handle(Consumer<Throwable> handler);

    <E extends Throwable> CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> handle(
            Class<E> exceptionType, Consumer<E> handler);

    CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> handleLast(Consumer<Throwable> handler);

    <E extends Throwable> CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> handleLast(
            Class<E> exceptionType, Consumer<? super E> handler);

    TSafe unsafe();
    TSafe rethrow(Function<Throwable, Exception> transformer);
    TSafe suppress();
    TSafe orElse(R value);
    TSafe orElseGet(Supplier<R> valueProvider);
}

final class CheckedWrapper<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> 
        implements CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> {

    private final TUnsafe function;
    private final ReduceFunction<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> reduceFunction;

    private final CheckedWrapper<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> root;
    private CheckedWrapper<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> next;

    private Consumer<Throwable> handlers = ex -> { };
    private Consumer<Throwable> lastHandlers = ex -> { };

    CheckedWrapper(TUnsafe function, 
            ReduceFunction<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> reduceFunction) {
        this.function = function;
        this.reduceFunction = reduceFunction;
        this.root = this;
    }

    private CheckedWrapper(TUnsafe function, 
            CheckedWrapper<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> prev) {
        this.function = function;
        this.reduceFunction = prev.reduceFunction;
        this.root = prev.root;
        prev.next = this;
    }

    @Override public CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> orTry(TUnsafe next) {
        return new CheckedWrapper<>(next, this);
    }

    @Override public CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> handle(
            Consumer<Throwable> handler) {
        handlers = handlers.andThen(handler);
        return this;
    }

    @Override public <E extends Throwable> CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> 
        handle(Class<E> exceptionType, Consumer<E> handler) {
        handlers = handlers.andThen(ex -> {
            if (exceptionType.isInstance(ex)) {
                handler.accept(exceptionType.cast(ex));
            }
        });
        return this;
    }

    @Override public CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> handleLast(
            Consumer<Throwable> handler) {
        lastHandlers = lastHandlers.andThen(handler);
        return this;
    }

    @Override public <E extends Throwable> CheckedBuilder<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> 
        handleLast(Class<E> exceptionType, Consumer<? super E> handler) {
        lastHandlers = lastHandlers.andThen(ex -> {
            if (exceptionType.isInstance(ex)) {
                handler.accept(exceptionType.cast(ex));
            }
        });
        return this;
    }

    @Override public TSafe unsafe() {
        return root.reduce(ex -> Try.throwAsUnchecked(ex));
    }

    @Override
    public TSafe rethrow(Function<Throwable, Exception> transformer) {
        return root.reduce(ex -> Try.throwAsUnchecked(transformer.apply(ex)));
    }

    @Override public TSafe suppress() {
        return root.reduce(ex -> null);
    }

    @Override public TSafe orElse(R value) {
        return root.reduce(ex -> value);
    }

    @Override public TSafe orElseGet(Supplier<R> valueProvider) {
        Objects.requireNonNull(valueProvider);
        return root.reduce(ex -> valueProvider.get());
    }

    private TSafe reduce(Function<Throwable, R> orResult) {
        return reduceFunction.wrap(function, 
                Optional.ofNullable(next).map(p -> p.reduce(orResult)), 
                this::handle, orResult);
    }

    private void handle(Throwable ex) {
        for (CheckedWrapper<TSafe, TUnsafe, R> current = this; 
                current != null; 
                current = current.next) {
            current.handlers.accept(ex);
        }
        lastHandlers.accept(ex);
    }
}

You cannot.

However, you may want to have a look at one of my projects which allows you to more easily manipulate such "throwing lambdas".

In your case, you would be able to do that:

import static com.github.fge.lambdas.functions.Functions.wrap;

final ThrowingFunction<String, Class<?>> f = wrap(Class::forName);

List<Class> classes =
    Stream.of("java.lang.Object", "java.lang.Integer", "java.lang.String")
          .map(f.orThrow(MyException.class))
          .collect(Collectors.toList());

and catch MyException.

That is one example. Another example is that you could .orReturn() some default value.

Note that this is STILL a work in progress, more is to come. Better names, more features etc.

The only built-in way of handling checked exceptions that can be thrown by a map operation is to encapsulate them within a CompletableFuture. (An Optional is a simpler alternative if you don't need to preserve the exception.) These classes are intended to allow you to represent contingent operations in a functional way.

A couple of non-trivial helper methods are required, but you can arrive at code that's relatively concise, while still making it apparent that your stream's result is contingent on the map operation having completed successfully. Here's what it looks like:

    CompletableFuture<List<Class<?>>> classes =
            Stream.of("java.lang.String", "java.lang.Integer", "java.lang.Double")
                  .map(MonadUtils.applyOrDie(Class::forName))
                  .map(cfc -> cfc.thenApply(Class::getSuperclass))
                  .collect(MonadUtils.cfCollector(ArrayList::new,
                                                  List::add,
                                                  (List<Class<?>> l1, List<Class<?>> l2) -> { l1.addAll(l2); return l1; },
                                                  x -> x));
    classes.thenAccept(System.out::println)
           .exceptionally(t -> { System.out.println("unable to get class: " + t); return null; });

This produces the following output:

[class java.lang.Object, class java.lang.Number, class java.lang.Number]

The applyOrDie method takes a Function that throws an exception, and converts it into a Function that returns an already-completed CompletableFuture -- either completed normally with the original function's result, or completed exceptionally with the thrown exception.

The second map operation illustrates that you've now got a Stream<CompletableFuture<T>> instead of just a Stream<T>. CompletableFuture takes care of only executing this operation if the upstream operation succeeded. The API makes this explict, but relatively painless.

Until you get to the collect phase, that is. This is where we require a pretty significant helper method. We want to "lift" a normal collection operation (in this case, toList()) "inside" the CompletableFuture -- cfCollector() lets us do that using a supplier, accumulator, combiner, and finisher that don't need to know anything at all about CompletableFuture.

The helper methods can be found on GitHub in my MonadUtils class, which is very much still a work in progress.

Here is a different view or solution for the original problem. Here I show that we have an option to write a code that will process only a valid subset of values with an option to detect and handle caseses when the exception was thrown.

    @Test
    public void getClasses() {

        String[] classNames = {"java.lang.Object", "java.lang.Integer", "java.lang.Foo"};
        List<Class> classes =
                Stream.of(classNames)
                        .map(className -> {
                            try {
                                return Class.forName(className);
                            } catch (ClassNotFoundException e) {
                                // log the error
                                return null;
                            }
                        })
                        .filter(c -> c != null)
                        .collect(Collectors.toList());

        if (classes.size() != classNames.length) {
            // add your error handling here if needed or process only the resulting list
            System.out.println("Did not process all class names");
        }

        classes.forEach(System.out::println);
    }

You can't do this safely. You can cheat, but then your program is broken and this will inevitably come back to bite someone (it should be you, but often our cheating blows up on someone else.)

Here's a slightly safer way to do it (but I still don't recommend this.)

class WrappedException extends RuntimeException {
    Throwable cause;

    WrappedException(Throwable cause) { this.cause = cause; }
}

static WrappedException throwWrapped(Throwable t) {
    throw new WrappedException(t);
}

try 
    source.stream()
          .filter(e -> { ... try { ... } catch (IOException e) { throwWrapped(e); } ... })
          ...
}
catch (WrappedException w) {
    throw (IOException) w.cause;
}

Here, what you're doing is catching the exception in the lambda, throwing a signal out of the stream pipeline that indicates that the computation failed exceptionally, catching the signal, and acting on that signal to throw the underlying exception. The key is that you are always catching the synthetic exception, rather than allowing a checked exception to leak out without declaring that exception is thrown.