Timeline for Isn't the use of pointer variables a memory overhead?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
32 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sep 14, 2021 at 8:32 | answer | added | Noob | timeline score: 1 | |
| Dec 15, 2015 at 17:17 | vote | accept | Sudip Bhandari | ||
| Dec 15, 2015 at 17:01 | comment | added | JimmyB |
Sometimes, you just don't know the address of a variable at compile time; at other times, you want to do the same thing on multiple different variables instead of duplicating code for every one of those variables. malloc is just a special case of the former: At compile time, you can't possibly know where the allocated memory will reside at runtime.
|
|
| Dec 15, 2015 at 15:25 | comment | added | gronostaj | Use of any variable is a memory overhead. | |
| Dec 15, 2015 at 12:53 | vote | accept | Sudip Bhandari | ||
| Dec 15, 2015 at 17:17 | |||||
| Dec 15, 2015 at 11:59 | comment | added | Yogu | Note that a far more relevant performance drawback of pointers is the potential cache miss that results from the indirect memory access. | |
| Dec 15, 2015 at 9:11 | comment | added | Joshua Bakker | As long as you don't forget to remove pointers you don't use anymore, it's okay. Also, if you got enough work memory, one pointer doesn't matter. But if you use too many without removing (especially if you don't need most of the pointers), you're in big trouble. | |
| Dec 15, 2015 at 8:45 | answer | added | paj28 | timeline score: 0 | |
| Dec 15, 2015 at 6:45 | comment | added | Emil Laine | Usually in time-critical applications you avoid pointers as much as possible, because of the indirection overhead (think cache misses). | |
| Dec 15, 2015 at 1:27 | comment | added | robert bristow-johnson | @DocBrown , while it might be true that the OP does not fully understand the purpose of pointers, it's a legit question, so i will undo your -1 with my +1, i think the two top-rated answers miss the boat entirely. | |
| Dec 15, 2015 at 0:12 | answer | added | Cort Ammon | timeline score: 0 | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 21:19 | history | tweeted | twitter.com/StackProgrammer/status/676511831905710081 | ||
| Dec 14, 2015 at 18:10 | comment | added | zwol | Memory overhead (along with its evil twin, cache unfriendliness) is a major reason why linked lists are discouraged nowadays. | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 17:21 | comment | added | Michael Shaw | This has the feel of some ones homework assignment. The question is designed to explore if the answer understands pointers and how they are used. | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 17:13 | comment | added | Ben Voigt | (Blog post showing the performance benefit: blog.juma.me.uk/tag/compressed-oops) | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 17:06 | comment | added | Ben Voigt | @ErikEidt: Actually, one JVM got a rather significant performance boost when they recognized the wastefulness of full-sized 64-bit pointers and switched to using indexes instead. | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 16:54 | answer | added | user204677 | timeline score: 3 | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 15:29 | answer | added | utnapistim | timeline score: 1 | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 15:19 | comment | added | Doc Brown | -1, the whole question is based on a very deep misconception - the OP has obviously not understood the purpose of pointers. | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 13:37 | comment | added | MSalters | Addresses can be stored in registers, so the assumption is already wrong. | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 12:05 | answer | added | Lightness Races in Orbit | timeline score: 6 | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 10:53 | comment | added | PJTraill | How about passing a (large) struct argument by address? If you count that as a pointer variable, it is unavoidable for many algorithms, and uses far less space than passing the struct by value! | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 10:53 | answer | added | Krrish Raj | timeline score: 5 | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 10:20 | answer | added | Lawrence | timeline score: 5 | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 8:27 | comment | added | Basile Starynkevitch | A pointer might sit in registers or be passed as an argument. In both cases there is no obvious memory overhead. And the pointer might be computed (e.g. thru pointer arithmetic, functions returning pointers, etc) | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 5:32 | answer | added | robert bristow-johnson | timeline score: 12 | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 4:49 | comment | added | Erik Eidt | How do you think other languages (Java,C#,...) store references to objects? (Hint: they use pointers). | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 2:37 | answer | added | Mike Nakis | timeline score: 35 | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 2:32 | answer | added | Telastyn | timeline score: 37 | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 2:27 | comment | added | James McLeod | The benefits of dynamic memory allocation vastly outweigh the cost of the pointer. | |
| Dec 14, 2015 at 2:15 | review | First posts | |||
| Dec 14, 2015 at 11:50 | |||||
| Dec 14, 2015 at 2:10 | history | asked | Sudip Bhandari | CC BY-SA 3.0 |