Re: Language Challenge 2000 - Update

[dvdeug@x8b4e53cd.dhcp.okstate.edu (David Starner)]

On Fri, 4 Feb 2000 15:35:02 -0800, Brian Rogoff <bpr@shell5.ba.best.com> wrote:
>On 4 Feb 2000, David Starner wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 4 Feb 2000 07:53:54 -0800, Brian Rogoff <bpr@shell5.ba.best.com> wrote:
>> >What is the opposite/dual of a "conservative" garbage collector?
>> One that collects stuff that's in use? (-: 
>
>The opposite/dual of a "conservative" garbage collector is a "precise" or
>"accurate" garbage collector.

Yes, I knew that. Hence the smiley. Sorry.

>A conservative garbage collector (and really 
>garbage collector should be in quotes) is not guaranteed to collect all 
>garbage. Does that help a little? 

Sure, but a generational GC won't collect all the garbage each time
it does garbage collection, either. And most GC's will overlook a 
technically live pointer that won't get used again.

Anyway, how would you implement a "precise" garbage collector in
pure Ada? The only way I can see working is by manually adding roots,
like GCC (2.96)'s internal GC does. But that's a pain that's also
mistake-prone. I probably don't understand storage pools well enough
for this, though.

-- 
David Starner - dstarner98@aasaa.ofe.org
Only a nerd would worry about wrong parentheses with
square brackets. But that's what mathematicians are.
   -- Dr. Burchard, math professor at OSU