#WShell RESIdent Problem?
05-Oct-88 18:02:54
Sb: #14678-#WShell RESIdent Problem?
Fm: Bill Hawes 72230,267
To: KEITH YOUNG 73170,307
The Amiga's memory management routine will do all they can to try to
deliver the memory you ask for, including (if necessary) asking any
resident but unused libraries and devices to expunge themselves. If a
program really needs lots of memory, then it should of course ask for it
and have the system free up anything it can.
This approach to memory management can work very effectively by letting
library-based software stick around in memory even if it's not being used,
while still being able to reclaim the space when needed. A good example is
the way WordPerfect is built; it has several big libraries that take a
while to load from floppies, but once loaded can be fired up immediately.
But if some other software comes along and needs the memory, it can get
it.
It's really only the _unnecessary_ calls to free up memory that are
systemand user-unfriendly; it doesn't break anything to have to reload a
library, but just takes longer to do it.