English

There Ain't No Such Thing as a Free Custom Memory Allocator

Software Engineering 2022-12-23 v1

Abstract

Using custom memory allocators is an efficient performance optimization technique. However, dependency on a custom allocator can introduce several maintenance-related issues. We present lessons learned from the industry and provide critical guidance for using custom memory allocators and enumerate various challenges associated with integrating them. These recommendations are based on years of experience incorporating custom allocators into different industrial software projects.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2206.11728,
  title  = {There Ain't No Such Thing as a Free Custom Memory Allocator},
  author = {Gunnar Kudrjavets and Jeff Thomas and Aditya Kumar and Nachiappan Nagappan and Ayushi Rastogi},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2206.11728},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

4 pages. To be published in 38th IEEE International Conference on Software Maintenance and Evolution (ICSME 2022), Oct 3-7, 2022, Limassol, Cyprus

R2 v1 2026-06-24T12:01:52.919Z