From: Charles Oliver Nutter <charles.nutter@...>
Date: 2008-02-29T01:25:33+09:00
Subject: Re: Ruby GC

Eliot Miranda wrote:
> Charles Oliver Nutter wrote:
>> Pie Squared wrote:
>>> So, my question is, does Ruby's GC (which is a mark-and-sweep
>>> collector, I believe) deal with segmentation, and if it does, how?
>>> Also, how does it deal with internal pointers to objects on the heap
>>> if those objects are moved? (I mean, if theres a pointer to an object
>>> in the heap, and the object is moved, how does Ruby locate it again?
>>> Or does it avoid this situation by using some sort of lookup
>>> mechanism?)
>>
>> Ruby 1.8.6 and 1.9 do not have compacting collectors, so the memory 
>> space gets increasingly more segmented.
> 
> The correct term is fragmentation.  Segmentation is something quite 
> different, the division of main memory into memory subsystems/regions.

Right you are. I used the OP's term to avoid confusion there.

- Charlie