On 28/08/2012 2:29 PM, Sam Steingold wrote:
At the end of a for loop its variables are still present:for (i in 1:10) { x <- vector(length=100000000) } ls() will print "i" and "x". this means that at the end of the for loop body I have to write rm(x) gc() is there a more elegant way to handle this?
You should put most code in functions, so i and x will be locals and will be automatically collected when your function returns. You rarely need to call gc() explicitly; R will do automatic collections.
There are exceptions to the automatic collection. For example, if your return value is a function, its environment will include all the locals, and they will persist as long as the returned function does. If you have big local values like your x and you don't need them as part of the environment of your function, then you might want to remove them explicitly. The only reason I ever call gc() is for debugging, but others may have good reasons for asking space to be freed sooner rather than later.
Duncan Murdoch ______________________________________________ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
