Patent Document ID: 20040088337
Application ID: 10287852
Patent Flag: 0

Claim One:
1. For employing a computer system that includes memory to perform garbage collection, a method comprising: A) treating a generation in the memory as divided into car sections organized into trains that have a front-to-rear order, each of at least one train being divided into a plurality of subtrains such that each car belonging to that train belongs to one subtrain thereof; and B) collecting the generation in accordance with the train algorithm in collection increments with which respective collection sets in the generation are associated, i) in each of at least some of which collection increments: a) objects in the collection set referred to by references outside the collection set are so evacuated to respective trains containing those references that, for at least one said train that has been thus divided into subtrains, the choice of which car in that train an object from the collection set is evacuated into so depends on which subtrain a reference thereto is located that the object is evacuated to a given car in that train only if the given car belongs to a subtrain that contains a reference to that object; and b) the collection set is reclaimed; and ii) in each of at least some of which collection increments: a) a determination is made of whether any references located outside the farthest-forward train refer to objects within that train; and b) each car section belonging to that train is reclaimed if there are no such references.