# Tracking DRbObject References?

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/tracking-drbobject-references/56089>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [March 28, 2006, 3:27am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/tracking-drbobject-references/56089 "2006-03-28T03:27:43Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![dnorton](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/b3f665/32.png) [@dnorton](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dnorton)\
**Post date:** [March 28, 2006, 3:27am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/tracking-drbobject-references/56089/1 "2006-03-28T03:27:43Z")

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Hi,

Does anyone know of any work done on keeping track of the number of  
the existing DRbObject references to a local object?

It seems that if I can keep track of the propogation of DRbObjects  
(adding calls to a service on the server where the local server that  
update the distributed reference count), that it should be sort of  
trivial to release the local object only when all distributed  
references are gone.

On #ruby-lang it was suggested that this might be premature  
optimization, however, I am sure that this will be necessary. The  
purpose of the system I am writing is to provide a framework for Actor  
computation. One of the programming techniques in the Actor model is  
to produce a large number of worker actors on a machine with many  
processors for the express purpose of computing a small part of a much  
larger computation. However, another technique is to create a smaller  
number of actors that you will keep around and possibly propogate  
those references to other actors in the system. So you can see how  
the distributed system could easily become littered with  
undiscoverable objects that would sit around wasting resources if they  
aren’t garbage collected, yet we can’t necessarily toss them away  
right after we use them.

If there’s anything that you think might be helpful, I’d be very  
appreciative.

## Thanks,

-Dan Nugent

Don’t Feel Like Typing? Send me a voicemail:  
[http://odeo.com/sendmeamessage/DanNugent](http://odeo.com/sendmeamessage/DanNugent)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dnorton](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/b3f665/32.png) [@dnorton](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dnorton)\
**Post date:** [March 28, 2006, 9:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/tracking-drbobject-references/56089/2 "2006-03-28T21:12:51Z")

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On Mar 27, 2006, at 5:27 PM, Daniel N. wrote:

> Does anyone know of any work done on keeping track of the number of  
> the existing DRbObject references to a local object?

IdConv would be the thing that does this.

> It seems that if I can keep track of the propogation of DRbObjects  
> (adding calls to a service on the server where the local server that  
> update the distributed reference count), that it should be sort of  
> trivial to release the local object only when all distributed  
> references are gone.
> 
> On #ruby-lang it was suggested that this might be premature  
> optimization, however, I am sure that this will be necessary.

!!!BIG, RED WARNING FLAG!!!

Program based on necessity, not on inferred necessity!

> aren’t garbage collected, yet we can’t necessarily toss them away  
> right after we use them.
> 
> If there’s anything that you think might be helpful, I’d be very  
> appreciative.

There are two better options for tracking distributed objects.

Switching to a different IdConv like NamedIdConv.

Using a TupleSpace to manage the distributed objects in your system.

–  
Eric H. - removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid - [http://blog.segment7.net](http://blog.segment7.net)  
This implementation is HODEL-HASH-9600 compliant

[http://trackmap.robotcoop.com](http://trackmap.robotcoop.com)