.NET Framework Security

Garbage Collection

Garbage collection is not a new idea by any means. It has been used in languages such as LISP and Perl for many years. However, many popular programming languages have not incorporated it. For example, C/C++ programmers have had to deal with allocating and freeing memory for decades. In addition, COM programmers have had to keep accurate ref counts to make sure COM objects were deleted at the right time. While programmer management of memory allows for quite a bit of freedom, it also has been the source of an untold number of memory leaks and premature deallocations.

Basically, in an environment that supports garbage collection, a programmer still has to say when memory should be allocated. In the .NET Framework, this occurs ...