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Seems like a user problem more than anything else
However both doesn't match Zig's expected alloc/free allocator interface, which is an interesting design challenge on its own.
I found this bit lovely: the author has independently reinvented the core idea of semispace copying garbage collectors (see eg https://wingolog.org/archives/2022/12/10/a-simple-semi-space...).
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Will do, I have just been procrastinating too much!
Such linear allocators are not too uncommon in embedded / static allocation context, but one definitely needs to know how they work. So first thought was you didn't read the docs, but docs do not clearly state that behavoour that is ugly (:
I know absolutely nothing about Zig (but I know C) and when I read "FixedBufferAllocator" I immediately guessed what the problem would be. I can see why it is claimed as a C replacement. I am actually kind of surprised the author spent so much time figuring it out. The name of the allocator is not that well-defined, but at least to me it hints of it being simpler rather than full-featured allocator. I would also imag…
After reading the description of the problem, I also had the thought, "Maybe FixedBufferAllocator is a bump allocator?". So before reading further, I checked the documentation to see if I was right. Turns out .. there is no documentation for FixedBufferAllocator? Here's the documentation page: https://ziglang.org/documentation/master/std/#A;std:heap.Fix... . It just lists a couple methods, most of which have the desc…
They're pretty explicit about not taking too much effort to document stuff in the stdlib, because any given thing in there may or may not make the final cut when the stdlib is stabilized (this is deliberate because they don't want to make people pissed or burned out for putting effort into documentation that winds up getting nuked). While FBA (or something like it) will likely make the cut, I'd say, maybe give them a break?
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Why? All words are coined at some point.
well for one, because the correct word "idiomatic" already exists: https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Programming_idiom
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Thanks for the pointers! > use a GeneralPurposeAllocator and setting "enable_memory_limit" and "requested_memory_limit" Interesting! I hadn't looked at GeneralPurposeAllocator too closely, but yes these seem like the right way to do things instead of abusing FixedBufferAllocator as I did. > If the purpose is to "only use the stack"... Not really, I just had to decide on some arbitrary upper bound on the mem usage, an…
>Is there a better way? Just let the kernel handle it. The virtual memory and mapped memory abstraction the kernel has makes your program's implementation simpler.
TL;DR: the author had to figure out the hard way that Zig's FixedBufferAllocator is a bump allocator, and that it doesn't reuse freed memory except when it's the last allocation.
Nit: /last/latest/
I’m not defending nor criticizing that fact or the OP, but it is the state of things today. Even the existence of the library docs is marked “experimental” on https://ziglang.org/learn/
Maybe it’s not emphasized enough.
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well for one, because the correct word "idiomatic" already exists: https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Programming_idiom
there's a lot of sunlight between the class of things that are idiomatic and the class of things that are anti-patterns; and there are likely things that are idiomatic but still anti-patterns (yes, you can do this, and if you did this it would look like this, and it causes no regression in this particular case, but don't get in the habit of doing it this way because it can cause a hard-to-spot regression in the gener…
I agree with all that, but patternic is not a word.