• "chrisk" <not here.com> Jul 12 2006
• Chris Nicholson-Sauls <ibisbasenji gmail.com> Jul 12 2006
• Frank Benoit <keinfarbton nospam.xyz> Jul 13 2006
• Hasan Aljudy <hasan.aljudy gmail.com> Jul 12 2006
• Frank Benoit <keinfarbton nospam.xyz> Jul 13 2006
• "Boris Wang" <nano.kago hotmail.com> Jul 13 2006

"chrisk" <not here.com> writes:

I'm interested in trying D for writing some audio fx plugins. Basicly the 
plugin would be a dll with 2 threads, a GUI and an Audio thread. Is it 
posible to prevent the GC from running during the audio thread? Can the 
audio thread stop the CG? As the dll will be loaded into a host application 
does that mean the GC will halt the all dll and application threads while it 
runs?

thanks,

chris 

Chris Nicholson-Sauls <ibisbasenji gmail.com> writes:

chrisk wrote:
 I'm interested in trying D for writing some audio fx plugins. Basicly the 
 plugin would be a dll with 2 threads, a GUI and an Audio thread. Is it 
 posible to prevent the GC from running during the audio thread? Can the 
 audio thread stop the CG? As the dll will be loaded into a host application 
 does that mean the GC will halt the all dll and application threads while it 
 runs?
 
 thanks,
 
 chris 
 


You can control the GC via the 'std.gc' import, which exposes the
'std.gc.disable()' and 
'std.gc.enable()' functions for turning automatic collection off/on, and the 
'std.gc.fullCollect()' function for manually initiating a collection run.

See: http://digitalmars.com/d/phobos/std_gc.html

As far as I know, in the case of cross-language DLL's (I assume the program
you're writing 
the plugin for is not in D itself), the GC will only pause the DLL's own
threads, but I 
could be wrong.

-- Chris Nicholson-Sauls

Frank Benoit <keinfarbton nospam.xyz> writes:

 You can control the GC via the 'std.gc' import, which exposes the
 'std.gc.disable()' and 'std.gc.enable()' functions for turning automatic
 collection off/on, and the 'std.gc.fullCollect()' function for manually
 initiating a collection run.
 


disable and enable is not implemented. See dmd/src/phobos/internal/gc/gcx.d
Search for the use of the 'disabled' variable.

Hasan Aljudy <hasan.aljudy gmail.com> writes:

chrisk wrote:
 I'm interested in trying D for writing some audio fx plugins. Basicly the 
 plugin would be a dll with 2 threads, a GUI and an Audio thread. Is it 
 posible to prevent the GC from running during the audio thread? Can the 
 audio thread stop the CG? As the dll will be loaded into a host application 
 does that mean the GC will halt the all dll and application threads while it 
 runs?
 
 thanks,
 
 chris 
 
 


Well, you could disable the GC, but I think you lose a lot of D Power by 
doing that.
You can manually delete objects/arrays when you know you're not going to 
use them anymore, even when the GC is enabled.

I'm not familiar at all with audio programming, but I think you can 
design your code such that there is always very little garbage, while 
leaving the GC running in the background, to clean any garbage you might 
have forgotten to clean manually.
Maybe calling std.gc.fullCollect() everynow and then (while there is 
still little garbage) may help in this case.

However, all of that is a bunch of wild guesses off the top of my head. 
I haven't tested any of it and I don't know if it eliminates any pauses 
caused by the GC or not.

Frank Benoit <keinfarbton nospam.xyz> writes:

chrisk schrieb:
 I'm interested in trying D for writing some audio fx plugins. Basicly the 
 plugin would be a dll with 2 threads, a GUI and an Audio thread. Is it 
 posible to prevent the GC from running during the audio thread? Can the 
 audio thread stop the CG? As the dll will be loaded into a host application 
 does that mean the GC will halt the all dll and application threads while it 
 runs?
 
 thanks,
 
 chris 
 
 


The actual implementation of the phobos GC is triggered every time you
allocate new memory. This happens if you call 'new', increase the size
of an array, use '~' or use code which does this. If your thread is only
a little piece of code, you can perhaps write it, not using any allocation.

Interrupting the GC is possible, but it is a risk. You must be sure not
to manipulate memory in a way that affects the GC. (No allocations, no
moving of references ) If you are sure it doesn't you need a way to
reactivate your thread. An OS timer? The GC uses the Thread.pauseAll.
You can use resume or just run in the OS callback?

"Boris Wang" <nano.kago hotmail.com> writes:

ErLang's GC can support soft-real-time applicaitons.

Has no information about D's GC.


"chrisk" <not here.com> дÈëÏûÏ¢ÐÂÎÅ:e940bv$2rup$1 digitaldaemon.com...
 I'm interested in trying D for writing some audio fx plugins. Basicly the 
 plugin would be a dll with 2 threads, a GUI and an Audio thread. Is it 
 posible to prevent the GC from running during the audio thread? Can the 
 audio thread stop the CG? As the dll will be loaded into a host 
 application does that mean the GC will halt the all dll and application 
 threads while it runs?

 thanks,

 chris