> Also, is there any way I can remove invocations of these in 
> the Socket code or in StandardFileStream>>open:forWrite:? (To 
> me, these are very important. This GC is signifigant in the 
> overhead when building a new VM.)

Yes, please do.  You might add alternate methods that will do the retry
for those that want that behavior.  But the basic methods shouldn't
impose that penalty.  If you are careful about closing files that you
open, and you canonicalize the open instances, you can avoid the need
for the retry with GC.

- Stephen