Re: gc: Lua vs. Python

["James Dennett" <james.dennett@...>]

On Sun, Oct 19, 2008 at 5:39 AM, Enrico Colombini <erix@erix.it> wrote:
> While discussing Lua with a colleague, I've been told that Python's gc has
> no limitations. I vaguely remembered otherwise, by my recollections could be
> out-of-date.
>
> Could somebody point out the gc differences between the two languages?
> (I know that Python can also use reference counting, but it's gc I'm
> interested in)

Roughly, depending on my memory: Python 1.x supported reference
counting only.  Python 2.x adds support for garbage collection of
cycles.  The VM-based implementations of Python (Jython, IronPython)
use the GCs of their underlying VMs.

I'm no expert on GC in Python, but as a user I don't see any huge
differences between GC in Lua and in Python 2.x.

-- James