From: matz@... (Yukihiro Matsumoto)
Date: 2002-06-21T12:29:10+09:00
Subject: Re: Improving Ruby's garbage collector for interactive apps

Hi,

In message "Re: Improving Ruby's garbage collector for interactive apps"
    on 02/06/21, Matthew Bloch <mattbee@soup-kitchen.net> writes:

|> Yes and yes.  Generational mark and sweep algorithm was done before,
|> but it was not good enough, probably due to write barrior cost.
|
|Which algorithm in particular, and how was the barrier implemented?  Did you 
|use OS page protection or catch it at application level?

It's based on linked generations, and the barrier was implemented by
application level.  OS page protection is not portable.

Long time ago, before I implemented Ruby's own GC, I tried to use
Boehm GC, but it dumped core immediately.  The situation might have
changed in the last 9 years.

Upon recent CPU power / memory size situation, the simplest GC scheme
rarely cause problems, except when too many objects are allocated.
Am I too optimistic?

							matz.