Hi friends,
In an interview a question was asked in C to me. The question is:
Why we often use malloc instead of calloc though calloc provides or intializes the elements to 0 when allocated. I was baffled by this. I have not even thinked about this. I wonder why most of programmers use only malloc. Is there any mem related problems in Calloc or what's the solutions to this. Please let me know about it.
Saravanan.T.S.
Beginner.
Well sometime it is used when you need to set the memory to zero ( obviously ). Often times when you allocate memory you immediately initialize it so it would be wasteful to use calloc in that situation. There is a time and place for each call.
"...the results are undefined, and we all know what "undefined" means: it means it works during development, it works during testing, and it blows up in your most important customers' faces." --Scott Meyers
calloc takes more cpu cycles
"Assumptions are the mother of all **** ups!"
I would rather prefer using calloc instead of malloc.I have seen a number of instances when programmers use a combination of malloc and memset calls to allocate and initiliaze memory.I think of instead of using two different calls one could use calloc.
I was going to write an answer, but then I remembered there's one in the FAQ already.
The important thing to remember is relating to NULL pointers (detailed in the FAQ too)
When all else fails, read the instructions.
If you're posting code, use code tags: [code] /* insert code here */ [/code]
