Description
This function controls and triggers the primitive garbage collection
mechanism, which is used for all symbolic objects.
Every symbolic object is either a value
or a variable object.
Value objects carry intermediate results
and may be deleted immediately after their usage.
Variable object are those created by
Variable(..).
They should be assigned to Scilab variables and deleted manually
using free(..).
Without input argument, gc() performs manual garbage
collection, i.e. all value objects are
deleted, and the number n of deleted objects is
returned.
The argument auto sets the garbage collection mode
to automatic (%t) or manual (%f) and
returns the previous mode setting.
In automatic mode all value
objects are deleted automatically after their first usage.
By default, the garbage collection mode is manual,
this is most convenient for carrying out interactive
calculations in the Scilab command window.
