calloc man page on Darwin

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MALLOC(3)		 BSD Library Functions Manual		     MALLOC(3)

NAME
     calloc, free, malloc, realloc, reallocf, valloc — memory allocation

SYNOPSIS
     #include <stdlib.h>

     void *
     calloc(size_t count, size_t size);

     void
     free(void *ptr);

     void *
     malloc(size_t size);

     void *
     realloc(void *ptr, size_t size);

     void *
     reallocf(void *ptr, size_t size);

     void *
     valloc(size_t size);

DESCRIPTION
     The malloc(), calloc(), valloc(), realloc(), and reallocf() functions
     allocate memory.  The allocated memory is aligned such that it can be
     used for any data type, including AltiVec- and SSE-related types.	The
     free() function frees allocations that were created via the preceding
     allocation functions.

     The malloc() function allocates size bytes of memory and returns a
     pointer to the allocated memory.

     The calloc() function contiguously allocates enough space for count
     objects that are size bytes of memory each and returns a pointer to the
     allocated memory.	The allocated memory is filled with bytes of value
     zero.

     The valloc() function allocates size bytes of memory and returns a
     pointer to the allocated memory.  The allocated memory is aligned on a
     page boundary.

     The realloc() function tries to change the size of the allocation pointed
     to by ptr to size, and returns ptr.  If there is not enough room to
     enlarge the memory allocation pointed to by ptr, realloc() creates a new
     allocation, copies as much of the old data pointed to by ptr as will fit
     to the new allocation, frees the old allocation, and returns a pointer to
     the allocated memory.  If ptr is NULL, realloc() is identical to a call
     to malloc() for size bytes.  If size is zero and ptr is not NULL, a new,
     minimum sized object is allocated and the original object is freed.  When
     extending a region allocated with calloc(3), realloc(3) does not guaran‐
     tee that the additional memory is also zero-filled.

     The reallocf() function is identical to the realloc() function, except
     that it will free the passed pointer when the requested memory cannot be
     allocated.	 This is a FreeBSD specific API designed to ease the problems
     with traditional coding styles for realloc causing memory leaks in
     libraries.

     The free() function deallocates the memory allocation pointed to by ptr.
     If ptr is a NULL pointer, no operation is performed.

RETURN VALUES
     If successful, calloc(), malloc(), realloc(), reallocf(), and valloc()
     functions return a pointer to allocated memory.  If there is an error,
     they return a NULL pointer and set errno to ENOMEM.

     For realloc(), the input pointer is still valid if reallocation failed.
     For reallocf(), the input pointer will have been freed if reallocation
     failed.

     The free() function does not return a value.

DEBUGGING ALLOCATION ERRORS
     A number of facilities are provided to aid in debugging allocation errors
     in applications.  These facilities are primarily controlled via environ‐
     ment variables.  The recognized environment variables and their meanings
     are documented below.

ENVIRONMENT
     The following environment variables change the behavior of the alloca‐
     tion-related functions.

     MallocLogFile <f>		  Create/append messages to the given file
				  path <f> instead of writing to the standard
				  error.

     MallocGuardEdges		  If set, add a guard page before and after
				  each large block.

     MallocDoNotProtectPrelude	  If set, do not add a guard page before large
				  blocks, even if the MallocGuardEdges envi‐
				  ronment variable is set.

     MallocDoNotProtectPostlude	  If set, do not add a guard page after large
				  blocks, even if the MallocGuardEdges envi‐
				  ronment variable is set.

     MallocStackLogging		  If set, record all stacks, so that tools
				  like leaks can be used.

     MallocStackLoggingNoCompact  If set, record all stacks in a manner that
				  is compatible with the malloc_history pro‐
				  gram.

     MallocStackLoggingDirectory  If set, records stack logs to the directory
				  specified instead of saving them to the
				  default location (/tmp).

     MallocScribble		  If set, fill memory that has been allocated
				  with 0xaa bytes.  This increases the likeli‐
				  hood that a program making assumptions about
				  the contents of freshly allocated memory
				  will fail.  Also if set, fill memory that
				  has been deallocated with 0x55 bytes.	 This
				  increases the likelihood that a program will
				  fail due to accessing memory that is no
				  longer allocated.

     MallocCheckHeapStart <s>	  If set, specifies the number of allocations
				  <s> to wait before begining periodic heap
				  checks every <n> as specified by
				  MallocCheckHeapEach.	If
				  MallocCheckHeapStart is set but
				  MallocCheckHeapEach is not specified, the
				  default check repetition is 1000.

     MallocCheckHeapEach <n>	  If set, run a consistency check on the heap
				  every <n> operations.	 MallocCheckHeapEach
				  is only meaningful if MallocCheckHeapStart
				  is also set.

     MallocCheckHeapSleep <t>	  Sets the number of seconds to sleep (waiting
				  for a debugger to attach) when
				  MallocCheckHeapStart is set and a heap cor‐
				  ruption is detected.	The default is 100
				  seconds.  Setting this to zero means not to
				  sleep at all.	 Setting this to a negative
				  number means to sleep (for the positive num‐
				  ber of seconds) only the very first time a
				  heap corruption is detected.

     MallocCheckHeapAbort <b>	  When MallocCheckHeapStart is set and this is
				  set to a non-zero value, causes abort(3) to
				  be called if a heap corruption is detected,
				  instead of any sleeping.

     MallocErrorAbort		  If set, causes abort(3) to be called if an
				  error was encountered in malloc(3) or
				  free(3) , such as a calling free(3) on a
				  pointer previously freed.

     MallocCorruptionAbort	  Similar to MallocErrorAbort but will not
				  abort in out of memory conditions, making it
				  more useful to catch only those errors which
				  will cause memory corruption.	 MallocCorrup‐
				  tionAbort is always set on 64-bit processes.

     MallocHelp			  If set, print a list of environment vari‐
				  ables that are paid heed to by the alloca‐
				  tion-related functions, along with short
				  descriptions.	 The list should correspond to
				  this documentation.

DIAGNOSTIC MESSAGES
SEE ALSO
     leaks(1), malloc_history(1), abort(3), malloc_size(3),
     malloc_zone_malloc(3), posix_memalign(3), libgmalloc(3)

BSD				 Aug 13, 2008				   BSD
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