What kind of memory leaks can be detected by Valgrind tool explain?

This tool can detect the following memory related problems : Use of uninitialized memory. Reading/writing memory after it has been freed. Reading/writing off the end of malloc’d blocks.

How does Valgrind detect memory corruption?

Valgrind Memcheck is a tool that detects memory leaks and memory errors. Some of the most difficult C bugs come from mismanagement of memory: allocating the wrong size, using an uninitialized pointer, accessing memory after it was freed, overrunning a buffer, and so on.

How does Valgrind detect uninitialized memory?

You can use Valgrind with any program. Valgrind works by doing a just-in-time (JIT) translation of the input program into an equivalent version that has additional checking. For the memcheck tool, this means it literally looks at the x86 code in the executable, and detects what instructions represent memory accesses.

How to detect memory leaks using Valgrind memcheck tool?

As clear from the command above, the main binary is ‘Valgrind’ and the tool which we want to use is specified by the option ‘–tool’. The ‘a.out’ above signifies the executable over which we want to run memcheck. This tool can detect the following memory related problems :

Where can I find the documentation for Valgrind?

Valgrind runs on Linux systems and, in Ubuntu, can be obtained from the repository. Its official documentation can be found in http://valgrind.org/ Valgrind’s Memcheck tool is useful to look for unexpected access to the memory, which are likely related to bugs in your code.

How to use Valgrind to detect invalid heap memory?

Valgrind can also find the use of invalid heap memory using the memcheck tool. For instance, if you allocate an array with malloc or new and then try to access a location past the end of the array: char *x = malloc(10); x[10] = ‘a’; Valgrind will detect it.

Are there any other programs like Valgrind for Windows?

Alternatively, for Windows users who want to develop Windows-specific software, you might be interested in IBM’s Purify, which has features similar to Valgrind for finding memory leaks and invalid memory accesses. A trial download is available.