An errortext holds the text of an error message.

DocBook provides four elements for identifying the parts of an error message: errorcode, for the alphanumeric error code (e.g., “–2”); errorname, for the symbolic name of the error (e.g., “ENOENT”); errortext, for the text of the error message (e.g., “file not found”); and errortype, for the error type (e.g., “recoverable”).

Prior to DocBook V4.2, the errorname element was the recommended element for error messages. However, this left no element for symoblic names, so the errortext element was added and the semantics of the error elements adjusted slightly.

errorcode, errorname, errortype, msgset