What is malloc doing, anyway?
The gist
Developer Ben M. Andrew published an article explaining how malloc gets memory from the kernel.
The piece walks through building a memory allocator, a core topic for C programmers.
How it unfolded
- Nov 8, 2026Ben M. Andrew publishes "What is `malloc` doing, anyway?", an introduction to memory allocation and the syscalls used to implement an allocator in a typical Unix userspace.
- Nov 9, 2026The article is submitted to Lobsters, where a commenter suggests adding a discussion of the binary buddy allocation scheme.
- Nov 9, 2026The article is posted to Hacker News by benmandrew with 5 points.
Key terms
- malloc
- A C standard library function that allocates a block of dynamic memory.
- memory allocator
- A component that manages allocation and freeing of memory for programs at their request.
- system calls
- A programmatic interface through which a program requests services from the operating system kernel.
Source: Wikipedia