From: Sean Middleditch <elanthis@...>
Date: 2002-05-04T14:04:57+09:00
Subject: Re: Is ruby ready for prime time?

On Sat, 2002-05-04 at 00:50, dagang wang wrote:
> I am writing a test script for a c api. Following is a piec e of pseudo-code
> 
> ....
> MyStruct* pRes;
> unsigned long length;
> getData(&pRes, &length);
> // a check shows pRes is initialized ok
> VALUE arr=rb_str_new2("text") // I suppose some memory allocation is done
> here
> //oops. a check shows pRes is corrupted
> 
> I encountered many such problems in my development related to memory
> management. I have the feeling that Ruby is not ready for prime time. At
> least for the Ruby-C extension part. I wonder if anyone else has the same
> experience and knows how to get around it.

Um, I'd say that's a problem with *your* code, not Ruby.  Many many many
other C extensions work perfectly well.

One thing to remember is that Ruby uses a GC for memory management.  If
you allocate one Ruby value, then a second, there is a chance on the
second allocation that the first one will be deleted (because the second
may trigger a run of the GC, and that will detect that nothing
references the first value, and delete it).  Thus, you need to make sure
after each value allocation that Ruby knows you are using it.  Depending
on what you're doing, there are different ways of doing that.

I'd recommend reading the documentation, because that should all be
fairly clear once it's read.

And, not to nitpick, but a subject like "is ruby ready for prime time?"
is not at all the best thing to do - I'd try something like "I'm having
trouble with memory mangement."  The first is offensive with no good
reason, the second is actually relevant to your e-mail.  ^,^

> 
> Doug
> 
>