[azure-storage-file-datalake] Checking for a non-existent file induces memory leak

[hallmeier]

• Package Name: azure-storage-file-datalake
• Package Version: 12.23.0 (current)
• Operating System: Linux and Darwin
• Python Version: 3.14.3 (current)

Describe the bug
When the existence of a non-existent file is checked with the Azure file client, objects in parent scopes are not garbage collected anymore.

To Reproduce
I reproduced this on Linux machines running in Azure Kubernetes and a Mac both in and outside of a Docker container. MWE:

import os

from azure.storage.filedatalake import FileSystemClient
from time import sleep

account_name = os.environ["ACCOUNT_NAME"]
file_system_name = os.environ["FILE_SYSTEM_NAME"]
sas_token = os.environ["SAS_TOKEN"]
directory_name = os.environ["DIRECTORY_NAME"]
file_name = os.environ["FILE_NAME"]


file_system_client = FileSystemClient(account_url=f"https://{account_name}.dfs.core.windows.net",
                                      file_system_name=file_system_name, credential=sas_token)
directory_client = file_system_client.get_directory_client(directory_name)


def check_file():
    file_client = directory_client.get_file_client(file_name)
    file_client.exists()
    big_list = list(range(10000000))


i = 0
while True:
    i += 1
    print(f"Iteration {i}")
    check_file()
    sleep(0.5)

This fills about 1 GB of memory every 5 iterations, eventually leading to an out-of-memory error.

Expected behavior
This should be able to run forever, as it is when the file existence check is omitted or the existence of an existent file is checked.