I am trying to create an asset manager for my textures. I had the
idea ( it may be a wrong idea ) to create a hashmap of my
textures with a string as the key. When the program request a
texture, it firts check if it is in the hashmap and then returns
if it is :
Texture[string] textures;
Texture loadTexture(string filename) {
if(filename in textures)
return textures[filename]
else
// Load image and put it in hashmap
}
Warning : I haven't tested if it actually doesn't work, but
thinking about it, i think it should not.
My problem is that i return a reference of the texture to the
program, but i keep one to myself and i want to free the texture
if my program isn't using it anymore ( no more reference to it ).
The problem i see, is that i will always have atleast one
reference to the texture in my hashmap, but i want the garbage
collector to ignore that reference and to free the texture if
there are no more references anywhere in my program ( except in
the hashmap ).
How could i tell the garbage collector to ignore the reference in
the hashmap and to free it if there isn't any other reference
that in my hashmap?
