Handling specific errors in JavaScript (think exceptions)

As noted in the comments below this is Mozilla specific, but you can use 'conditional catch' blocks. e.g.:

try {
  ...
  throwSpecificError();
  ...
}
catch (e if e.sender === "specific") {
  specificHandler(e);
}
catch (e if e.sender === "unspecific") {
  unspecificHandler(e);
}
catch (e) {
  // don't know what to do
  throw e;
} 

This gives something more akin to typed exception handling used in Java, at least syntactically.

To create custom exceptions, you can inherit from the Error object:

function SpecificError () {

}

SpecificError.prototype = new Error();

// ...
try {
  throw new SpecificError;
} catch (e) {
  if (e instanceof SpecificError) {
   // specific error
  } else {
    throw e; // let others bubble up
  }
}

A minimalistic approach, without inheriting from Error, could be throwing a simple object having a name and a message properties:

function throwSpecificError() {
  throw {
    name: 'SpecificError',
    message: 'SpecificError occurred!'
  };
}


// ...
try {
  throwSpecificError();
} catch (e) {
  if (e.name == 'SpecificError') {
   // specific error
  } else {
    throw e; // let others bubble up
  }
}