What is an “internal address” in Java?

This is clearly implementation-specific.

Below I include the Object.hashCode() implementation used in OpenJDK 7.

The function supports six different calculation methods, only two of which take any notice of the object’s address (the “address” being the C++ oop cast to intptr_t). One of the two methods uses the address as-is, whereas the other does some bit twiddling and then mashes the result with an infrequently-updated random number.

Of the remaining methods, one returns a constant (presumably for testing), one returns sequential numbers, and the rest are based on pseudo-random sequences.

It would appear that the method can be chosen at runtime, and the default seems to be method 0, which is os::random(). The latter is a linear congruential generator, with an alleged race condition thrown in. 🙂 The race condition is acceptable because at worst it would result in two objects sharing the same hash code; this does not break any invariants.

The computation is performed the first time a hash code is required. To maintain consistency, the result is then stored in the object’s header and is returned on subsequent calls to hashCode(). The caching is done outside this function.

In summary, the notion that Object.hashCode() is based on the object’s address is largely a historic artefact that has been obsoleted by the properties of modern garbage collectors.

// hotspot/src/share/vm/runtime/synchronizer.hpp

// hashCode() generation :
//
// Possibilities:
// * MD5Digest of {obj,stwRandom}
// * CRC32 of {obj,stwRandom} or any linear-feedback shift register function.
// * A DES- or AES-style SBox[] mechanism
// * One of the Phi-based schemes, such as:
//   2654435761 = 2^32 * Phi (golden ratio)
//   HashCodeValue = ((uintptr_t(obj) >> 3) * 2654435761) ^ GVars.stwRandom ;
// * A variation of Marsaglia's shift-xor RNG scheme.
// * (obj ^ stwRandom) is appealing, but can result
//   in undesirable regularity in the hashCode values of adjacent objects
//   (objects allocated back-to-back, in particular).  This could potentially
//   result in hashtable collisions and reduced hashtable efficiency.
//   There are simple ways to "diffuse" the middle address bits over the
//   generated hashCode values:
//

static inline intptr_t get_next_hash(Thread * Self, oop obj) {
  intptr_t value = 0 ;
  if (hashCode == 0) {
     // This form uses an unguarded global Park-Miller RNG,
     // so it's possible for two threads to race and generate the same RNG.
     // On MP system we'll have lots of RW access to a global, so the
     // mechanism induces lots of coherency traffic.
     value = os::random() ;
  } else
  if (hashCode == 1) {
     // This variation has the property of being stable (idempotent)
     // between STW operations.  This can be useful in some of the 1-0
     // synchronization schemes.
     intptr_t addrBits = intptr_t(obj) >> 3 ;
     value = addrBits ^ (addrBits >> 5) ^ GVars.stwRandom ;
  } else
  if (hashCode == 2) {
     value = 1 ;            // for sensitivity testing
  } else
  if (hashCode == 3) {
     value = ++GVars.hcSequence ;
  } else
  if (hashCode == 4) {
     value = intptr_t(obj) ;
  } else {
     // Marsaglia's xor-shift scheme with thread-specific state
     // This is probably the best overall implementation -- we'll
     // likely make this the default in future releases.
     unsigned t = Self->_hashStateX ;
     t ^= (t << 11) ;
     Self->_hashStateX = Self->_hashStateY ;
     Self->_hashStateY = Self->_hashStateZ ;
     Self->_hashStateZ = Self->_hashStateW ;
     unsigned v = Self->_hashStateW ;
     v = (v ^ (v >> 19)) ^ (t ^ (t >> 8)) ;
     Self->_hashStateW = v ;
     value = v ;
  }

  value &= markOopDesc::hash_mask;
  if (value == 0) value = 0xBAD ;
  assert (value != markOopDesc::no_hash, "invariant") ;
  TEVENT (hashCode: GENERATE) ;
  return value;
}