What is the garbage collector in Java?

Question

I am new to Java and confused about the garbage collector in Java. What does it actually do and when does it comes into action. Please describe some of the properties of the

Answer 1

Automatic garbage collection is the process of looking at heap memory, identifying which objects are in use and which are not, and deleting the unused objects. An in use object, or a referenced object, means that some part of your program still maintains a pointer to that object. An unused object, or unreferenced object, is no longer referenced by any part of your program. So the memory used by an unreferenced object can be reclaimed.

In a programming language like C, allocating and deallocating memory is a manual process. In Java, process of deallocating memory is handled automatically by the garbage collector. Please check the link for a better understanding. http://www.oracle.com/webfolder/technetwork/tutorials/obe/java/gc01/index.html