Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!usc!pollux.usc.edu!papa
From: papa@pollux.usc.edu (Marco Papa)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech
Subject: Re: Flushing handlers out of memory.
Message-ID: <18551@usc.edu>
Date: 16 Jul 89 01:03:02 GMT
References: <59256@linus.UUCP>
Sender: news@usc.edu
Reply-To: papa@pollux.usc.edu (Marco Papa)
Organization: Felsina Software, Los Angeles, CA
Lines: 41

In article <59256@linus.UUCP> rachamp@mbunix.mitre.org (Champeaux) writes:
>While writing PLT:, I've found myself rebooting the computer every time
>I make a change so that the new version will be loaded into memory.  This
>can happen very often when I'm chasing down a bug by adding debug messages.
>In his example ram disk handler, Matt Dillon's solution to flushing out the
>handler was a program to allocate all the memory, hoping to cause exec to
>flush it.  In a POSTTER file, he said that may not work after all and suggested
>using multiple mountlist entries.

Matt's solution worked for me. I am developing XPR-based external protocol
libraries. When I make a change after I run the external protocol library,
I select another protocol (which produces a CloseLibrary, and the use count
goes to zero). Then I run FlushAll (see later). I check with Xoper's lib
command that the library is flushed and then test the new library after having
it copied to LIBS:. I know the same works for devices and I see no reason
why it shouldn't work for handlers.  Here is the stupid code for that:

#include "stdio.h"
#include "exec/types.h"
#include "functions.h"

main()
{
  char *ptr;

  ptr = (char *) AllocMem(16000000L, 0L); /* cause the expunge */
  if (ptr != NULL) FreeMem(ptr, 16000000L);
}

Note that this code should NOT be included at the end of a program to force
a "global" expunge to satisfy all the reviewers that run AvailMem to check 
if a program frees all the resources it has allocated. Jimm will hang you for
that :-) I was doing that in A-Talk III (yes, I repent :-). The next version 
will use the newly-"recommended" way of expunging the serial device "by name"
(see Bryce Nesbitt example in AmigaMail).

-- Marco Papa 'Doc'
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