Several times in the last few years, I have written about the subject of memory management, garbage collection, and object lifetime. Some of essays I’ve written on this subject include: The Semantics of Garbage Collection More Thoughts on Resource Recovery Other Resource Recovery Approaches Resource Management Revisited Recently, I was thinking about this issue again… Read More »
As I said in Joel on Wrong-Looking Code, I find Joel on Software to be a good source of information on programming. However, I don’t always agree with him. In Joel on Software – Making Wrong Code Look Wrong, Joel states that he does not like exceptions. He also refers to a previous article Joel… Read More »
In The Semantics of Garbage Collection, I explained why I don’t like the term garbage collection. I also introduced the term resource recovery, and suggested that this change in naming could generate a useful change in viewpoint. In the next article, More Thoughts on Resource Recovery, I traced some of the history and side effects… Read More »
In The Semantics of Garbage Collection, I explained why I don’t like the term garbage collection. I also introduced the term resource recovery, and suggested that this change in naming could generate a useful change in viewpoint. Many programmers have been indoctrinated with the belief that garbage collection is the solution to all memory problems,… Read More »
I have a confession to make. I’ve never really been comfortable with garbage collection. Now, before you dismiss me as a Luddite who has obviously never worked with an advanced programming language, let me explain. I’m familiar with many different forms of garbage collection. I have worked in languages with and without garbage collection. I’ve… Read More »
What does it mean for an object to die? In C++, there are several distinct and well-defined stages in the death of an object. Other languages do this a little differently, but the general concepts remain the same. This is the basic chain of events for an item on the stack. Object becomes inaccessible Object… Read More »
When talking about Object Oriented Programming, there are several principles that are normally associated with the paradigm: polymorphism, inheritance, encapsulation, etc. I feel that people tend to forget the first, most important principle of OOP: object lifetime. One of the first things that struck me when I was learning OOP in the C++ programming language… Read More »