Editing Hashlife (section)

==Drawbacks==
Like many [[Memoization|memoized]] codes, Hashlife can consume significantly more [[computer memory|memory]] than other algorithms, especially on moderate-sized patterns with a lot of entropy, or which contain subpatterns poorly aligned to the bounds of the quadtree nodes (i.e. power-of-two sizes); the cache is a vulnerable component. It can also consume more time than other algorithms on these patterns. [[Golly (program)|Golly]], among other Life simulators, has options for toggling between Hashlife and conventional algorithms.

Hashlife is also significantly more complex to [[computer programming|implement]]. For example, it needs a dedicated [[garbage collection (computer science)|garbage collector]] to remove unused nodes from the cache.

Due to being designed for processing generally predictable patterns, chaotic and explosive rules generally operate much more poorly under Hashlife than they would under other implementations.<ref>HashLife algorithm description in Golly: "Note that HashLife performs very poorly on highly chaotic patterns, so in those cases you are better off switching to QuickLife."</ref>