Python's garbage collection was Re: Python reliability

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    Diez> AFAIK some LISPs do a similar trick to carry int values on
    Diez> cons-cells.  And by this tehy reduce integer precision to 28 bit
    Diez> or something. Surely _not_ going to pass a regression test suite
    Diez> :)

I'm pretty sure this was tried a few years ago w/ Python.  I don't recall
the results, but I'm pretty sure they weren't good enough.  had they been we
could just look at the source.

Folks, most common GC schemes have been tried as experiments over the years.
None have succeeeded, for various reasons.  I think one of the main reasons
is that Python has to "play nice" with external libraries, many of which
weren't written with GC beyond malloc and free in mind.

Here are some pointers interested readers might want to check out:

    Tagged integers: 
        http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2004-July/046139.html

    Boehm GC:
        http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-January/051370.html
        http://www.python.org/doc/faq/general.html#how-does-python-manage-memory
        http://wiki.python.org/moin/CodingProjectIdeas/PythonGarbageCollected

    Miscellaneous:
        http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2002-June/026032.html
        http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2003-November/040299.html

And lest anyone here think they were the first to suggest getting rid of
reference counting in Python:

    http://www.python.org/search/hypermail/python-1993/0554.html

I wouldn't be surprised if there were even earlier suggestions...

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