When will Java go mainstream like Python?

[Chris Rebert]

On Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 11:03 PM, sjdevnull at yahoo.com
<sjdevnull at yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Feb 24, 8:05 pm, Lawrence D'Oliveiro <l... at geek-
> central.gen.new_zealand> wrote:
>> In message <op.u8nfpex8y5e8ok at laptopwanja>, Wanja Gayk wrote:
>>
>> > Reference counting is about the worst technique for garbage collection.
>>
>> It avoids the need for garbage collection.
>
> That's like saying that driving a VW Beetle avoids the need for an
> automobile.  Reference counting is a form of garbage collection (like
> mark-sweep, copy-collect, and others), not a way of avoiding it.
>
> You're right that ref counting in many implementations is more
> deterministic than other common forms of garbage collection; IMO,
> Python would be well-served by making the ref-counting semantics it
> currently has a guaranteed part of the language spec--or at least
> guaranteeing that when a function returns, any otherwise unreferenced
> locals are immediately collected.
>
> I could be convinced otherwise, but I _think_ that that change would
> offer an alternative to all of the interesting cases of where the
> "with" statement is "useful".

You're forgetting global context objects, such as those for Decimal:
http://docs.python.org/library/decimal.html#decimal.localcontext

Cheers,
Chris
--
http://blog.rebertia.com