From: Benjohn Barnes <benjohn@...>
Date: 2006-05-28T19:38:23+09:00
Subject: Re: object.reference_count


On 28 May 2006, at 10:41, Jeff Rose wrote:
>
> This spawned from a conversation with a friend who was working in C+ 
> + on a system that is all reference count based.  He asked how it  
> would work in ruby, and I didn't know.
>
> Thanks for the help Tim.

When I first came to Ruby, I'd been using C++'s Boost library, and  
the smart pointer in that [1]. I noticed that Ruby didn't have a weak  
pointer, and felt I'd find that a problem. I made a lot of use of  
weak pointers in manager objects; they'd only manage something for as  
long as other people made use of it. I've definitely not needed them  
at all though, so maybe it's no big issue :)


[1] Boost and the STL were the best things about C++ for me. They  
really transformed my experience with the language.