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Re: Beginner with Cocoa
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Re: Beginner with Cocoa


  • Subject: Re: Beginner with Cocoa
  • From: Erik Buck <email@hidden>
  • Date: Mon, 24 Mar 2008 10:13:48 -0400

> You'll probably have to learn the old way, "retain and release,"
> which is unique to Objective-C.

For the record, reference counting for memory management is one of the oldest techniques in software and is not unique to Objective-C or Cocoa. Microsoft Foundation Class CString uses it. COM/Active-X IUnknown uses it. It's essential to using DirectX. It's essential to using embedded controls.

The C++ Boost library provides "smart" pointers that are reference counted. Many Unix like operating systems use reference counted resources including file descriptors, semaphores, I/O buffers, and shared memory regions.

Different people learn different skills and mindsets in different orders, but let's be realistic - if reference counted memory management is too difficult for people to use, the people probably shouldn't call themselves programmers. That doesn't mean reference counting has to be the first thing a newbie learns, but refusing to learn it begs the question - what other basic programming techniques are being skipped ?

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