A comparison of various C Programming memory debuggers
- Dmalloc
- Electric Fence
- Valgrind
- Memwatch
- Mtrace
- AddressSanitizer (ASAN)
From the Mind_Monitor directory:
devops/script/dependency_checker.sh
| Tool | Verify | Install |
|---|---|---|
| Dmalloc | dmalloc --version |
apt install libdmalloc* |
| Electric Fence | dpkg-query --list electric-fence |
apt install electric-fence |
| Valgrind | valgrind --version |
apt install valgrind |
| Memwatch | ls src/memwatch.? |
devops/script/install_memwatch.sh |
| Mtrace | mtrace --version |
Built into glibc |
| ASAN | gcc -fsanitize=address --version |
apt install gcc |
From the Mind_Monitor directory:
devops/script/test_all.sh
| Filename | Description | Dmalloc | Electric Fence | Valgrind | Memwatch | Mtrace | ASAN |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| bad_code1.c | Uninit. mem | ❌💢 | ❌ | ✔️ | ❌ | ❌ | ✔️💢 |
| bad_code2.c | Buffer overflow (Heap) | ✔️💢💥 | ❌ | ✔️ | ✔️ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| bad_code3.c | Memory leak | ✔️💢 | ❌ | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| bad_code4.c | Invalid mem access | ❌💢 | ❌💥 | ✔️ | ❌ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| bad_code5.c | Double free | ✔️💢💥 | ✔️💥 | ✔️ | ✔️ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| bad_code6.c | Uninit. integer | ❌💢 | ❌ | ✔️ | ❌💢 | ❌ | ❌ |
| bad_code7.c | Overlapping memcpy | ❌💢 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| bad_code8.c | Fishy malloc values | ✔️💢💥 | ✔️💥 | ✔️💥 | ❌💥 | ❌💥 | ✔️ |
| bad_code9.c | Fishy calloc values | ✔️💢💥 | ❌💥 | ✔️💥 | ❌💥 | ❌💥 | ✔️ |
| bad_code10.c | Multi-process memory leak | ✔️💢 | ❌ | ❌ | ✔️ | ✔️💢 | ❌ |
| bad_code11.c | Multi-process double free | ❌💢 | ✔️ | ❌ | ✔️ | ❌ | ❌ |
| bad_code12.c | Multi-thread memory leak | ✔️💢 | ❌ | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| bad_code13.c | Multi-thread double free | ✔️💢 | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ | ❌💥 | ✔️ |
| bad_code14.c | Multi-process memory leak (wait) | ✔️ | ❌ | ❌ | ✔️ | ❌ | ❌ |
| bad_code15.c | Multi-process double free (wait) | ❌ | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| bad_code16.c | Buffer overflow (Stack) | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✔️ |
LEGEND
| Emoji | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 💢 | False positive, misleading/missing results |
| 💥 | Seg fault or core dump |
| ❔ | Test not yet executed |
| ✔️ | Succeeded in finding the error |
| ❌ | Failed to find the error |
NOTES:
- Some ideas came from https://valgrind.org/docs/manual/mc-manual.html
- Bad Code 10 is the multi-process version of Bad Code 3
- Bad Code 11 is the multi-process version of Bad Code 5
- Bad Code 12 is the multi-thread version of Bad Code 3
- Bad Code 13 is the multi-thread version of Bad Code 5
- Bad Code 14 is Bad Code 10 with waitpid() implemented
- Bad Code 15 is Bad Code 11 with waitpid() implemented
- Turns out Mtrace's response to Bad Code 13 isn't anything above and beyond normal execution
- Bad Code 16 borrowed heavily from Bad Code 2
- *_code6_memwatch.bin and *_code16_memwatch.bin are failing to create a log file at runtime. Theory: "...memwatch will auto-initialize on the first call to a memory function..." and neither test case calls a memory function. I verified the binaries were linked against memwatch (e.g., `readelf -a *_code6_memwatch.bin | grep mw`). I even tried to manually initialize memwatch with `mwInit()`, `mwDoFlush(1)`, and `mwTerm()`.
- Dmalloc - 9/16
- Electric Fence - 5/16
- Valgrind - 11/16
- Memwatch - 9/16
- Mtrace - 2.5/16
- ASAN - 12/16
NOTE: Mtrace has seemingly non-deterministic results for Bad Code 10 so it gets a 💢 and a half point
On a scale of 1 to 5 (5 being the easiest to use):
- Dmalloc - 2/5
- Electric Fence - 3/5
- Valgrind - 4/5
- Memwatch - 3/5
- Mtrace - 3/5
- ASAN - 5/5
On a scale of 1 to 5 (5 being the easiest to read):
- Dmalloc - 2/5
- Electric Fence - 4/5
- Valgrind - 3/5
- Memwatch - 5/5
- Mtrace - 5/5
- ASAN - 4/5
Ranked best to worst:
- ASAN (85.0%)
- Memwatch (72.1%)
- Valgrind (69.6%)
- Mtrace (58.5%)
- Electric Fence (57.1%)
- Dmalloc (45.4%)
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