Partitioned array objects in a distributed runtime

At a computer system including at least one processor and a memory, in a computer networking environment including a plurality of computing systems, a computer-implemented method for managing memory on worker processes of a distributed software application, the method comprising:

• an act of determining that a distributed software function has finished processing, the distributed software function including one or more shim objects instantiated on a master rank and one or more worker ranks of the distributed application, the shim objects being configured to store a reference to an instance of a native partitioned array, the reference including a unique identifier for the native partitioned array instance;
• upon determining that the distributed software application has finished processing, an act of allowing the shim objects instantiated on the worker ranks to go out of scope;
• an act of marking the out-of-scope worker ranks for garbage collection;
• and
• an act of removing the worker ranks marked for garbage collection.

A computer system comprising the following:

• one or more processors;
• system memory;
• one or more computer-readable storage media having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, causes the computing system to perform a method for using object serialization to communicate references to shim objects, the method comprising the following:
• an act of instantiating shim objects on one or more ranks of a distributed application, the shim objects being configured to store a reference to an instance of a native partitioned array, the reference including a unique identifier for the native partitioned array instance, the shim being instantiated in response to receiving an indication that a distributed function has been invoked on a master process of a distributed software application;
• an act of serializing the shim objects for communication of the stored references from the master rank of the distributed application to one or more worker ranks of the distributed application;
• upon serializing the shim objects, an act of communicating the shim object's stored references to the one or more worker ranks of the distributed application;
• and
• an act of sending one or more operations that are to be performed on the native partitioned array to the unique identifier in the stored reference of the shim object.