Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uflorida!rex!samsung!munnari.oz.au!sirius.ucs.adelaide.edu.au!levels!ccdn
From: CCDN@levels.sait.edu.au (david newall)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: malloc/free question
Message-ID: <14658@levels.sait.edu.au>
Date: 4 May 90 16:40:58 GMT
References: <2638831C.728C@telly.on.ca> <271@caslon.cs.arizona.edu> <ZR33D0Cggpc2@ficc.uu.net> <14320@levels.sait.edu.au> <15873@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Organization: Sth Australian Inst of Technology
Lines: 17

pfalstad@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Paul John Falstad) writes:
> They do say that their allocator looks for the "first fit," and not the
> "best fit;"

I believe their algorithm would be best described as "next fit" and not
"first fit".  Their algorithm allocates the next fit from the last block
allocated or deallocated.

A "first fit" allocater, IMHO, should allocate from the "start" every time.
This might not be very time efficient, but I observe that it doesn't suffer
from too much fragmentation.  At least, it doesn't for me.


David Newall                     Phone:  +61 8 343 3160
Unix Systems Programmer          Fax:    +61 8 349 6939
Academic Computing Service       E-mail: ccdn@levels.sait.oz.au
SA Institute of Technology       Post:   The Levels, South Australia, 5095