Semi-Automatic Region-Based Memory Management for Real-Time Java Embedded Systems

In this paper we address the problem of dynamic memory management in real-time Java embedded systems. Our work aims at suppressing the need for garbage collection in order to avoid unpredictable pause times. For that we use a simple static analysis algorithm coupled with region-based memory management as presented in [15]. To overcome the well-known limitations of region inference, we propose in this paper to involve the developer in the analysis process by providing feedback on programming constructs likely to produce memory leaks. Experiments show that for most programming patterns, our system behaves as efficiently as a garbage collector in terms of memory consumption. Our analysis tool is furthermore able to provide useful feedback to the programmer to pinpoint problematic constructs.