Rebrand GC as "automatic memory leak detection and cleanup"

[Paulo Pinto]

On Monday, 12 April 2021 at 22:47:29 UTC, James Lu wrote:
> As noted in another thread:
>
>> * The garbage collector eliminates probably 60% of potential 
>> users right off.
>
> If we rename garbage collection to "automatic memory leak 
> detection and cleanup." For people who write realtime 
> applications, that's what it is. D is garbage collected in the 
> sense that it's available as an option.
>
> Walter noted that with 20+ years of experience writing manually 
> managed code, he still could not write leak-free programs.
>
> I propose:
>
> * Rename GC to automatic memory leak detection and cleanup in 
> documentation
> * Make core.memory.__delete a better name. Perhaps 
> core.memory.free.
> * Runtime should have an option to emit a warning every time an 
> object is cleaned up on the major heap. There should be a 
> compiler or runtime option that attaches debug information so 
> we stack trace of the allocation. Optionally, this could be 
> enabled for certain classes via a UDA.
> * If possible, a compiler and/or runtime option to safely 
> detect and warn on double-frees. That way, we can boast being 
> memory-safe.
>
> As someone who writes a realtime, major-GC-is-not-allowed 
> JavaScript game, having the stack trace of where an object is 
> leaked helps fixing garbage generation greatly.

People that care about safety and real time GC don't need 
renaming to be convinced,

https://www.ptc.com/en/products/developer-tools/perc

https://www.ghs.com/partners/aicas_partner.html

Here is one example of how much real time it actually is,

https://www.ptc.com/en/blogs/plm/ptc-perc-virtual-machine-technology-at-the-of-aegis-the-shield-of-the-fleet

> Lockheed Martin reviewed various options for the Aegis Open 
> Architecture including the programming language and execution 
> environment for the system.  In their experiments, they found 
> that HotSpot Java code ran comparable to C++ on an experimental 
> 250 millisecond periodic workload.  At the same time, they 
> found that the Java language provided superior abstraction and 
> encapsulation than C++, and they judged that retraining their 
> existing staff of CMS-2 programmers to become effective in Java 
> would have lower risks than attempting to train them in C++.
> .....
> Using Java and PTC Perc Ultra, Lockheed found that newly 
> trained Aegis software engineers implemented a core component, 
> the Aegis Air Defense Warfare (ADW) software, consisting of 
> 150,000 source lines of code, in only 18 months, including test 
> and evaluation and full requirements verification.  The first 
> deployment based on the new Aegis Open Architecture required 
> only three years from hardware selection to on-ship hardware 
> refresh, compared to seven years or longer previously.
> ....
> After completing the Aegis Open Architecture refresh, support 
> was added for the new “Standard Missile 6” with only 3 
> additional months of development effort.  Based on experiences 
> with the legacy Aegis implementation, Lockheed would have 
> expected a minimum of a full year of additional development to 
> add support for a new missile.
> Obviously a notable success, Aegis, powered by PTC Perc is now 
> deployed on numerous U.S. ships and those of allied nations.  
> The program has also been expanded beyond shipboard deployment 
> to land-based installations called Aegis Ashore.


Naturally that won't change the mind of the anti-GC folks.