Gavin Kistner
10/5/2006 3:51:00 AM
From: Jan Svitok [mailto:jan.svitok@gmail.com]
> Another possibility is to implement a pool of objects directly into
> ExpensiveObject or to create a layer above it.
That is an option, although I didn't mention that one complicating factor is that all this is happening in a repetitive, update-frame-basis. I considered using object pools for a while, but it was annoying to have to have the object pool itself running every frame in order to reset the pool state, and to ensure that it ran before/after all other methods.
Plus, because speed is an issue here, I prefer solutions that don't involve the overhead of a function/method call to get an Expensive instance. (Of course, such a pool could be managed less cleanly as a global array/index combo, or such.) But that's less important for the Ruby solution.
Thanks for the contribution to the thread for posterity; it is important to keep pools in mind for this sort of problem.