A Fast Analysis for Thread-Local Garbage Collection with Dynamic Class Loading

Long-running, heavily multi-threaded, Java server applications make stringent demands of garbage collector (GC) performance. Synchronisation of all application threads before garbage collection is a significant bottleneck for JVMs that use native threads. We present a new static analysis and a novel GC framework designed to address this issue by allowing independent collection of threadlocal heaps. In contrast to previous work, our solution safely classifies objects even in the presence of dynamic class loading, requires neither write-barriers that may do unbounded work, nor synchronisation, nor locks during thread-local collections; our analysis is sufficiently fast to permit its integration into a high-performance, productionquality virtual machine.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2005
• Where: SCAM
• Authors: Richard E. Jones, Andy C. King
• Keywords: Garbage Collector, Java Server Applications, SCAM 2005, Software Engineering, Stringent Demands