Memory Leak in Functional Programming

Question

Because in pure functional programming objects are all immutable, is it still possible to create memory leak?

By pure functional program, I meant there are no side effect. Of course, this is not realistic since every program has I/O. But, let's just ignore the I/O for now.

You can cause Stack Overflow with recursive functions. very easy. — Tamar
– Tamar, Commented Jun 20, 2017 at 4:06
You might find this interesting: stackoverflow.com/questions/9952602/… — Evan Trimboli
– Evan Trimboli, Commented Jun 20, 2017 at 4:14
How do you define memory leak in this context? Also, there is no pure functional program, otherwise you would never see a result of your program. — Henry
– Henry, Commented Jun 20, 2017 at 4:15
I think by the definition, stack overflow is not memory leak since you don't loose any references. — gyoho
– gyoho, Commented Jun 20, 2017 at 4:15

Henry · Accepted Answer · 2017-06-20 04:37:41Z

2

I think this is a matter of how we define a memory leak. A program that runs for a very long time (potentially endlessly, like a server) can have a memory usage that is bounded or that grows more and more the longer the program is running. In the latter case, one speaks usually of a memory leak.

It is easy to write a functional program that needs more and more memory the longer it runs. So in that sense, memory leaks are possible.

answered Jun 20, 2017 at 4:37

Henry

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