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Comment by pjmlp | Hacker News Reader

That is the usual fallacy, because it assumes everyone has full access to whole source code and is tracking down all the places where heap is being used.

It also assumes that the OS doesn't lie to the application when allocations fail.

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Zig make allocations extremely explicit (even more than C) by having you pass around the allocator to every function that allocates to the heap. Even third-party libraries will only use the allocator you provide them. It's not a fallacy, you're in total control.

Why, are you going to abort if too many calls to the allocator take place?

You can if you want. You can write your own allocator that never actually touches the heap and just distributes memory from a big chunk on the stack if you want to. The point is you have fine grained (per function) control over the allocation strategy not only in your codebase but also your dependencies.

Allocation strategy isn't the same as knowing exactly exactly when allocations take place.

You missed the point that libraries can have their own allocators and don't expose customisation points.

sure they can. but why would they choose to?

Because the language doesn't prevent them, and they own their library.

the question remains – why would they choose to?

Because they decided to do so, regardless of people like yourself thinking they are wrong.

and so why should he be forced to not do so? he can cook his own thing outside of what most people using this language will do, and they will just not use it, and nothing's wrong with that.

They can, and they wouldn't be necessarily be wrong.

However if the library is trying to be as idiomatic / general purpose / good citizen as possible, then they should strongly consider not doing that and only use the user provided allocator (unless there is a clear and documented reason why that is not the case).

I don't think it would make sense to restrict this at the language level. As a developer it's up to you to exercise your judgement when you examine what libraries you choose to depend on.

I appreciate the fact it's a common design pattern in Zig libraries and I also appreciate the fact I'm not forced to do it if I don't want to. If it matters to me then I'll consider libraries that are designed that way, if it does not matter to me then I can consider libraries that do not support this.

That's not really an argument. What prevents the author of a library in any language from acting in bad faith and use antipatterns? That's not a problem that would only happen in the Zig language.

> pass around the allocator to every function that allocates to the heap.

what prevents a library from taking an allocator, saving it hidden somewhere and using it silently?

authors of the library

Nothing, but it would be bad design (unless there is a legitimate documented reason for it). Then it's up to you as the developer to exercise your judgment and choose what third-party libraries you choose to depend on.

> It also assumes that the OS doesn't lie to the application when allocations fail.

Gotta do the good ol'

  echo 2 >/proc/sys/vm/overcommit_memory

and maybe adjust overcommit_ratio as well to make sure the memory you allocated is actually available.

OS specific hack and unrelated to C.

Your comment was also OS-specific because Windows doesn't lie to applications about failed allocations.

Not at all, rather there is no guarantee that the C abstract machine described on ISO C, actually returns NULL on memory allocation failures as some C advocates without ISO C legalese expertise seem to advocate.

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