Garbage collection, Operating System

Assignment Help:

The dynamic memory allocator is a layer between the application and the OS, managing heap objects. When a program requests memory from the allocator (via malloc(), for instance), the allocator will return a pointer (or reference) to a piece of memory of the appropriate size. When the program is done with the memory, the memory should be released back to the allocator. Languages such as C and C++ leave this job to the programmer to perform manually, for example by using free(). On the other hand, languages such as Java, python, etc automatically manage dynamically-allocated memory, which makes the programmer's life easier, and can eliminate entire classes of memory management bugs.

Although using free() and delete is relatively simple, it can be tricky to get them right. A signi?cant fraction of bugs in C and C++ programs are related to manual memory management. If we forget to free objects, we end up with memory leaks; if we free memory too soon, we end up with "dangling pointers"; also, we can try to do weird things, like performing double frees, etc. Therefore, a process that manages memory automatically is clearly useful. The most important concept for correctly implementing a garbage collector is that of live objects: a live object is any object that can still be reached through one (or more) pointers.


Related Discussions:- Garbage collection

Major advantage of the layered approach to system design, Q. What is the ma...

Q. What is the major advantage of the layered approach to system design? What are the de-merits of using the layered approach? Answer: As in all cases of modular design as well

Timers could be utilized to compute the current time, Q. Timers could be ut...

Q. Timers could be utilized to compute the current time. Provide a little description of how this could be accomplished. Answer: A program could utilize the following ap

Can dhcp provide support for mobile users, Question: a) The Dynamic Ho...

Question: a) The Dynamic Host Control Protocol (DHCP) server is important for setting TCP/IP configuration, when there are a large number of clients on the network. How does D

Explain the communications of request or response interface, Explain the Co...

Explain the Communications of Request or Response Interface The inter-application communication must provide four specific interface to the CSInterface() components. A client m

Main advantage of the layered approach to system design, What is the main a...

What is the main advantage of the layered approach to system design? As in all cases of modular design, designing an operating system in a modular way has several benefits. Th

Define dynamic linking, Define dynamic linking. Dynamic linking is same...

Define dynamic linking. Dynamic linking is same to dynamic loading, rather that loading being postponed unless execution time, linking is postponed. This feature is usually use

Define properties of real time operating system, Define properties of Real ...

Define properties of Real time operating system Real time :- Often used in a dedicated application, this system reads information from sensors and must respond within a fixed a

Hashed page table, Hashed page tables A common approach for handling ad...

Hashed page tables A common approach for handling address spaces larger than 32 bits is to use a hashed page table. Every entry in the hash table having a linked list of elemen

Find the parent process and the child process, Q. When a process creates a...

Q. When a process creates a fresh process using the fork() operation which of the following state is shared among the parent process and the child process? 1 Stack 2 Heap

Multi user systems technology, describe main points of multiuser and multi ...

describe main points of multiuser and multi tasking operating systems.

Write Your Message!

Captcha
Free Assignment Quote

Assured A++ Grade

Get guaranteed satisfaction & time on delivery in every assignment order you paid with us! We ensure premium quality solution document along with free turntin report!

All rights reserved! Copyrights ©2019-2020 ExpertsMind IT Educational Pvt Ltd