Re: [Dynapi-Dev] Continuing Freeing memory

[Doug M. <do...@cr...>]

eh?
there IS a delete operator in JS.
and saying "the specs say that mem is autoatically cleaned"
is silly considering that we KNOW that it is not
----- Original Message -----
From: "Raymond Smith" <dst...@or...>
To: <dyn...@li...>
Sent: Wednesday, February 21, 2001 7:57 AM
Subject: Re: [Dynapi-Dev] Continuing Freeing memory


> More morning mind food (at least where I am)...
>
>
> The new operator allocates memory for objects. How is this memory
> deallocated?
>
> If you have ever programmed in C++, you might wonder why JavaScript does
not
> have a delete operator to match the new operator. The reason for this is
> simple: It's not necessary!
> In JavaScript, memory for objects is automatically reclaimed whenever
there
> is no longer need for the object. The JavaScript interpreter tracks
> references to objects and deletes them when variables no longer refer to
> them.
>
> For example, consider the following JavaScript code:
>
> d = new Array (50);
> d = null;
>
> The first statement allocates memory for an Array object large enough to
> hold 50 elements, and then records the fact that the new object is
> referenced by a variable named d.
> The next statement, however, changes d so that instead of referring to the
> Array object, it instead contains the special value null. Since there is
no
> longer any way to access the Array object, the JavaScript interpreter
> destroys it by reclaiming the memory that was allocated to it.
>
> Reclaiming memory allocated for objects which can no longer be accessed is
> called garbage collection. Allocated objects which are no longer
accessible
> by variables are called orphan objects.
>
> This next example shows how to modify the above code to prevent the
> destruction of the Array object:
>
> d = new Array (50);
> e = d; // make e refer to the same object as d
> d = null; // disassociate d from the Array object
> Since the Array object is referenced by e at the moment it is abandoned by
> d, the Array object remains intact.
> In conclusion, there is no need to worry about destroying objects in
> JavaScript. Garbage collection is performed automatically by the
interpreter
> whenever objects are no longer useful or documents are unloaded. If you
want
> to explicitly destroy an object, you can do so by abandoning it -- that
is,
> by making sure there are no variables that refer to it. (Setting the
> variables to null works pretty well for this.)
>
>
>
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