OBJ02-J. Avoid using finalizers

Before the garbage collector acts on an object to reclaim it, the object's finalizer is executed. This is required to ensure that resources such as open streams, files and network connections get freed since resource management does not happen automatically while reclaiming memory. In Java, the finalize method of java.lang.Object is used to perform this activity.

The caveats associated with the usage of finalizers are discussed below:

• There is no fixed time for finalizers to get executed, which again is JVM dependent: The only thing that is guaranteed is that a finalizer will be executed before the garbage collector's run. An object may become unreachable and yet its finalizer may not execute for an arbitrarily long time. Nothing of time-critical nature should be run in the finalize method, for instance, closing file handles is not recommended.

• Do not depend on a finalizer for updating critical persistent state: It is possible for the JVM to terminate without invoking the finalizer on an unreachable object. As a result it is not advisable to use any lock or sharing based mechanisms within a finalizer. Methods such as System.gc, System.runFinalization, System.runFinalizersOnExit and Runtime.runFinalizersOnExit are either just marginally better or have been deprecated due to lack of safety and deadlock causing effects.

• According to the Java Language Specification: [[JLS 05]] Section 12.6.2:

  The Java programming language imposes no ordering on finalize method calls. Finalizers may be called in any order, or even concurrently.

• Effect of uncaught exceptions: An uncaught exception thrown during finalization is ignored. The finalization process itself stops immediately so it fails to accomplish its purpose.

• Unintentional mistakes like memory leaks can also cause finalizers to never execute to completion.

• A possibility exists such that the programmer unintentionally resurrects the references in the finalize method. While the garbage collector must determine yet again whether the object is free to be deallocated, the finalize method is not invoked again.

Exceptions

OBJ02-EX1: Sometimes it is necessary to use finalizers especially while working with native objects/code. This is because the garbage collector cannot re-claim memory from code written in another language. Again, the native process must not perform any critical jobs that require immediate resource deallocation.

In such cases, finalize should be used correctly. Any subclass that overrides finalize must explicitly invoke the method for its superclass as well. There is no automatic chaining with finalize. The correct way to handle this is shown below.

protected void finalize() throws Throwable {
  try {
    //...
  }
  finally {
    super.finalize();
  }
}

Alternatively, a more expensive solution is to declare an anonymous class so that the finalize method is guaranteed to run for the superclass. This solution is applicable to public non-final classes. "The finalizer guardian object forces super.finalize to be called if a subclass overrides finalize and does not explicitly call super.finalize". [[JLS 05]] Section 12.6.1: Implementing Finalization.

public class Foo {
  // The finalizeGuardian object finalizes the outer Foo object
  private final Object finalizerGuardian = new Object() {
    protected void finalize() throws Throwable {
    // Finalize outer Foo object
    }
  };
  //...
}

Risk Assessment

Finalizers can have unexpected behavior.

Automated Detection

TODO

Related Vulnerabilities

Search for vulnerabilities resulting from the violation of this rule on the CERT website.

References

[[JLS 05]] Section 12.6, Finalization of Class Instances
[[Bloch 08]] Item 7, Avoid finalizers
[[Darwin 04]] Section 9.5, The Finalize Method
[[Flanagan 05]] Section 3.3, Destroying and Finalizing Objects
[[API 06]] finalize()