Resource management (computing): Difference between revisions

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In [[computer programming]], '''resource management''' refers to techniques for managing [[System resource|resources]] (components with limited availability). It includes both preventing [[resource leak]]s (releasingthe act of refusing to release a resource when a process has finished using it) and dealing with [[resource contention]] (when multiple processes wish to access a limited resource). Resource leaks are an issue in sequential computing, while resource contention is an issue in [[concurrent computing]]. This article discusses preventing resource leaks; see [[resource contention]] for resource management in that sense.

[[Computer program]]s may manage their own resources, and there are various techniques for resource management, depending on the [[programming language]]; {{harvtxt|Elder|Jackson|Liblit|2008}} is a survey article contrasting different approaches. Alternatively, they can be managed by a host – an [[operating system]] or [[virtual machine]] – or another program. This is known as ''resource tracking,'' and consists of cleaning up resource leaks: terminating access to resources that have been acquired but not released after use. This is known as ''reclaiming'' resources, and is analogous to [[Garbage collection (computer science)|garbage collection]] for memory. On many systems the operating system reclaims resources after the process makes the [[exit (system call)|exit]] [[system call]].