Interesting Memory Optimization

[Timon Gehr]

On 03/19/2012 01:33 PM, Derek wrote:
> On Fri, 16 Mar 2012 13:16:18 +1100, Kevin <kevincox.ca at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> This is in no way D specific but say you have two constant strings.
>>
>> const char[] a = "1234567890";
>> // and
>> const char[] b = "67890";
>>
>> You could lay out the memory inside of one another. IE: if a.ptr = 1
>> then b.ptr = 6. I'm not sure if this has been done and I don't think
>> it would apply very often but it would be kinda cool.
>>
>> I thought of this because I wanted to pre-generate hex-representations
>> of some numbers I realized I could use half the memory if I nested
>> them. (At least I think it would be half).
>
> Is the effort to do this really an issue with today's vast amounts of
> RAM (virtual and real) available? How much memory are you expecting to
> 'save'?
>

Using less memory means having less cache misses and therefore improved 
performance. Saving half the memory can make quite a difference.