what will the Finalizer thread do if there is a infinite loop or deadlock in the Java finalize method

Question

what will the Finalizer thread do if there is a infinite loop or deadlock in the Java finalize method.

Answer 1

The objects will not be "freed", that is the memory will not be claimed back from them and also resources that are freed in the finalize method will remain reserved throughout.

Basically there is a queue holding all the objects waiting for their finalize() method to be executed. Finalizer thread picks up objects from this queue - runs finalize - and releases the object.

If this thread will be deadlocked the ReferenceQueue Queue will grow up and at some point OOM error will become inexorable. Also the resources will be hogged up by the objects in this queue. Hope this helps!!

for(;;)
{
  Finalizer f = java.lang.ref.Finalizer.ReferenceQueue.remove();
  f.get().finalize();
}