6.7.1 Some Useful Memory Pools

The System.Pool_Global package offers the Unbounded_No_Reclaim_Pool storage pool. Allocations use the standard system call malloc while deallocations use the standard system call free. No reclamation is performed when the pool goes out of scope. For performance reasons, the standard default Ada allocators/deallocators do not use any explicit storage pools but if they did, they could use this storage pool without any change in behavior. That is why this storage pool is used when the user manages to make the default implicit allocator explicit as in this example:

type T1 is access Something;
 -- no Storage pool is defined for T2

type T2 is access Something_Else;
for T2'Storage_Pool use T1'Storage_Pool;
-- the above is equivalent to
for T2'Storage_Pool use System.Pool_Global.Global_Pool_Object;

The System.Pool_Local package offers the Unbounded_Reclaim_Pool storage pool. The allocation strategy is similar to Pool_Local except that the all storage allocated with this pool is reclaimed when the pool object goes out of scope. This pool provides a explicit mechanism similar to the implicit one provided by several Ada 83 compilers for allocations performed through a local access type and whose purpose was to reclaim memory when exiting the scope of a given local access. As an example, the following program does not leak memory even though it does not perform explicit deallocation:

with System.Pool_Local;
procedure Pooloc1 is
   procedure Internal is
      type A is access Integer;
      X : System.Pool_Local.Unbounded_Reclaim_Pool;
      for A'Storage_Pool use X;
      v : A;
   begin
      for I in  1 .. 50 loop
         v := new Integer;
      end loop;
   end Internal;
begin
   for I in  1 .. 100 loop
      Internal;
   end loop;
end Pooloc1;

The System.Pool_Size package implements the Stack_Bounded_Pool used when Storage_Size is specified for an access type. The whole storage for the pool is allocated at once, usually on the stack at the point where the access type is elaborated. It is automatically reclaimed when exiting the scope where the access type is defined. This package is not intended to be used directly by the user and it is implicitly used for each such declaration:

type T1 is access Something;
for T1'Storage_Size use 10_000;