Patent ID: 8443352

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving specification of a string within source code written in a programming language; and, processing the source code for ultimate execution of a computer program encompassing the source code, by at least: determining whether the string specified is a short string or a long string; processing the string in accordance with a first manner where the string is a short string, the first manner being such that upon the ultimate execution of the computer program, a memory heap of a computer system on which the computer program is executed is not employed, but rather a stack of the computer system is employed, to handle the short string during execution of the computer program; and, processing the string in accordance with a second manner where the string is a long string, the second manner being such that upon the ultimate execution of the computer program, the memory heap of the computer system on which the computer program is executed is employed to handle the long string during execution of the computer program, wherein the specification of the string does not include a type identifier indicating whether the string is a short strong or a long string, wherein determining whether the string specified is a short string or a long string comprises determining whether the string within the source code itself originally includes each of a plurality of predetermined characters, such that if the string includes all the predetermined characters then the string is concluded to be a short string, and if the string does not include all the predetermined characters then the string is concluded to be a long string, wherein the string is specified as a short string or a long string regardless of a length of the string, such that a given first string is determined as a short string and a given second string is determined as a long string even though a length of the given first string is greater than a length of the given second string, and wherein determining whether the string specified is a short string or a long string is performed without comparing the length of the string to a predetermined length and without inspecting the length of the string itself.