title: Automatic memory management == garbage collection?
body: <p>A friend is writing a book in a non-English language and has trouble translating garbage collection (GC). On the other hand, automatic memory management (AMM) translates very well.</p>
  
  <p>The Wikipedia <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garbage_collection_%28computer_science%29" rel="nofollow">article on GC</a> states that GC is a form of AMM. The same article also states that reference counting (RC) is a form of garbage collection. So, it would appear that we have AMM as a superset of GC, and GC as a superset of RC. However, there are many informal texts which use GC and AMM interchangeably. It therefore appears that one could safely say that AMM (also known as GC) has been realized either by identifying (un)reachable objects by tracing pointers or by relying on reference counts.</p>
  
  <p>My question is: is there any AMM technique which could not be classified as GC? Or, equivalently, is the distinction between GC and AMM justified?</p>
  
  <p>Please, feel free to comment on my wild guesses on AMM (GC) taxonomy :-) </p>