The Ghost in the Virtual Machine: A Reference to References

Have you ever wondered whether you should use a weak reference or a phantom reference? If you answered "yes" or "phantom who?" this is the session for you. It covers:

• The java.lang.ref API
• Its gotchas and pitfalls
• New APIs that address those gotchas and pitfalls
• Reference handling patterns and best practices
• MapMaker: a new concurrent map with support for strong, soft, or weak keys and values
• How references relate to collections, caching, concurrency, and class loaders
• And more

Walk in with a working knowledge of the language, and walk out an expert in references, referents, reclamation, and other garbage collection necromancy.