I am trying to create a 2D matrix in C (basically a dynamically allocatable 2d array of any given size) in both the most efficient and clean way possible. I had implemented such a thing in a larger project I am working on, but was having issues, and was able to narrow it down to the following.
I decided to malloc a giant array (I called it data), and then make an array of pointers (i called it cell) to be able to address the data in the big array in such a way that would make sense in a two-dimensional context (as in matrix[x][y] instead of data[ugly pointer arithmetic each time].) I thought this would be a good idea because it only calls malloc once, and so it would be faster, also, the allocated memory is in one consecutive block, which I believe (not too knowledgeable here) is a really good thing on some systems because of overhead in keeping track of allocated memory blocks.
#include <math.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <unistd.h>
typedef struct {
unsigned int sizeX;
unsigned int sizeY;
int **cell;
int *data; /* FOR INTERNAL USE ONLY */
} matrix;
matrix * matrix_malloc(unsigned int, unsigned int);
void matrix_free(matrix *);
void matrix_zero(matrix *);
void matrix_print(matrix *);
int
main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
int y, x;
matrix *theMatrix = NULL;
if (argc != 3) {
fprintf(stderr, "usage: %s sizeX sizeY\n", argv[0]);
return 1;
}
x = atoi(argv[1]);
y = atoi(argv[2]);
if (x < 10 || y < 10) {
fprintf(stderr, "usage: sizeX and sizeY must be >= 10\n");
return 1;
}
if ((theMatrix = matrix_malloc(x, y)) == NULL)
return 1;
matrix_zero(theMatrix);
/* lots of modification of the contents of the matrix would happen here */
matrix_print(theMatrix);
matrix_free(theMatrix);
return 0;
}
matrix *
matrix_malloc(unsigned int sizeX, unsigned int sizeY)
{
int i;
matrix *mat;
if ((mat = malloc(sizeof(matrix))) == NULL) {
return NULL;
}
if ((mat->data = malloc(sizeX * sizeY * sizeof(int))) == NULL) {
free(mat);
mat = NULL;
return NULL;
}
if ((mat->cell = malloc(sizeX * sizeof(int *))) == NULL) {
free(mat->data);
free(mat);
mat = NULL;
return NULL;
}
mat->sizeX = sizeX;
mat->sizeY = sizeY;
for (i = 0; i < sizeX; i++) {
mat->cell[i] = mat->data + mat->sizeX * i;
}
return mat;
}
void
matrix_free(matrix *mat) {
free(mat->cell);
free(mat->data);
free(mat);
mat = NULL;
}
void
matrix_zero(matrix *mat)
{
memset(mat->data, 0, mat->sizeX * mat->sizeY * sizeof(int));
}
void
matrix_print(matrix *mat)
{
unsigned int x, y;
for (x = 0; x < mat->sizeX; x++) {
for (y = 0; y < mat->sizeY; y++)
printf("%d ", mat->cell[x][y]);
printf("\n");
}
}
When I run the above program as ./a.out 10 10 there is no problem, but when I specify 30 20 instead of 10 10, I run into some issues.
On MacOSX (10.6.7) I get:
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 540024880 540024880 540024880 540024880 540024880 808465461 943207474 875896880 875704368 540031032
842216505 926168880 926425140 909719605 540031032 926234424 909325360 875896888 825438256 540160816 10 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
and then it exits properly.
On OpenBSD (4.7) I get this far:
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
and then it just segfaults
My initial thought was that it was just some issue when allocating big enough blocks of memory that they cross page boundaries, but when I use 50 50 as the size, it runs fine.
I’ve narrowed it down this far, and tried googleing (not quite sure what it is I should be searching for though 😐 ) and asked a few of my friends, but this has them all stumped.
I found C. Segmentation Fault when function modifies dynamically allocated 2d array int matrix with pointers in C – memory allocation confusion but they were not relevant (as far as I can tell).
If somebody could please point me in the right direction, perhaps point out the problem or point me to some relevant documentation, I would be very grateful.
One of these SizeX’es needs to be a sizeY.