Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!att!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!apple!oliveb!amiga!cbmvax!jesup From: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech Subject: Re: Minix, Unix on the Amiga, and flames on AmigaDOS braindamage... Message-ID: <7661@cbmvax.UUCP> Date: 15 Aug 89 00:59:59 GMT References: <1610@uw-entropy.ms.washington.edu> <195@VAX1.CC.UAKRON.EDU> <7570@cbmvax.UUCP> <4107@sugar.hackercorp.com> <4148@cps3xx.UUCP> Reply-To: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup) Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA Lines: 32 In article <4148@cps3xx.UUCP> porkka@frith.UUCP (Joe Porkka) writes: >In article <4107@sugar.hackercorp.com> karl@sugar.hackercorp.com (Karl Lehenbauer) writes: >>In article <7570@cbmvax.UUCP>, jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup) writes: >>> I consider any program on ANY os that doesn't >>> free what it allocates (memory, file locks, whatever) to be at best poorly >>> written. >> >>Careful, Randall, I think you've been using your Amiga too long. >> >>There is no reason a program should have to free its memory if the operating >>system does it. Programs written for such an OS cannot be considered > >Even worse, even in UNIX, is programs that fail to check if >they are out on memory. > >Most UNIX programs *do not* ever check this. UNIX programmers assume >a blissful computer with plenty enough VM to get by. Plus, as I said, even in unix it can be advantageous to free things you allocate, both from performance and ability to run in a (relatively) tight VM system. I used to free everything even when programming in Ada, though it was fairly standard just to drop things and forget them. I was told Ada assumed the memory would be recovered via garbage collection, or some such, but no one had ever written a compiler/run-time-package that did it. (my memory could be foggy on this.) -- Randell Jesup, Keeper of AmigaDos, Commodore Engineering. {uunet|rutgers}!cbmvax!jesup, jesup@cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com BIX: rjesup Common phrase heard at Amiga Devcon '89: "It's in there!"