From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-2.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,MAILING_LIST_MULTI autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Thread: 103376,21960280f1d61e84 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news2.google.com!news2.google.com!news3.google.com!news.germany.com!feed.xsnews.nl!border-1.ams.xsnews.nl!news.astraweb.com!newsrouter-eu.astraweb.com!proxad.net!cleanfeed2-a.proxad.net!nnrp6-1.free.fr!not-for-mail Return-Path: From: "Randy Brukardt" To: Subject: RE: How come Ada isn't more popular? Date: Fri, 9 Feb 2007 13:35:45 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.6604 (9.0.2911.0) In-Reply-To: X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2800.1807 Importance: Normal X-Trash-Finder: Limited filtering for message, local (outbound) source X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at ada-france.org X-BeenThere: comp.lang.ada@ada-france.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.9rc1 Precedence: list List-Id: "Gateway to the comp.lang.ada Usenet newsgroup" List-Unsubscribe: , List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Message-ID: X-Leafnode-NNTP-Posting-Host: 88.191.17.134 Organization: Guest of ProXad - France NNTP-Posting-Date: 09 Feb 2007 20:40:01 MET NNTP-Posting-Host: 88.191.14.223 X-Trace: 1171050001 news-4.free.fr 27170 88.191.14.223:56892 X-Complaints-To: abuse@proxad.net Xref: g2news2.google.com comp.lang.ada:9210 Date: 2007-02-09T20:40:01+01:00 Ray Blaak writes: > "Randy Brukardt" writes: > > I'm primarily interested in destroying the entire structure, and often I > > need no destruction at all: the structures exist until the termination of > > the program. There's no point of earlier cleanup in such programs, and > > surely no point in non-zero overhead to support such cleanup. I'm not aware > > of any zero-overhead GC algorithm, because the basic tenet of GC is that you > > can find all reachable objects: doing that requires some time and/or space > > overhead. > > I don't think anyone anywhere claims zero-overhead for GC. The whole point is > reasonable performance (in fact competitive with manual management) and a much > easier job for the programmer, in situations with highly dynamic > memory usage patterns. That's the crux of the disagrement, I think. You claim that "highly dynamic memory usage" is the normal case; I think it is *not* the usual case (or, at least, doesn't have to be the usual case - languages like Java make it that unnecessarily). > At any rate, one uses the tools that fit their needs. If you find yourself in > situations with stable data structures, then it sounds like you don't need GC, > plain and simple, or maybe even any cleanup at all. Right, but then why should it be a required and central part of general purpose programming languages. Surely, it should be available as an option for types that need it, but it certainly should not apply to all types. My programs tend to be plenty dynamic after all, but the dynamic is in the construction of the data structures. Destruction of them is unusual, and usually happens in a single operation (not piecemeal). And locals and temporaries are on the stack - no action at all is required to destroy them (you keep refering to this as "manual management", but there is nothing manual about it -- the compiler does all of the work). Randy.