[Python-Dev] survey of extension module memory managment (original) (raw)

Tim Peters tim.one@comcast.net
Mon, 18 Mar 2002 20:27:03 -0500

[Neil Schemenauer]

I randomly grabbed a bunch of extension modules by searching the python.org topic guides and by using Parnassus. I looked at 20 different packages. 12 of them implemented an extension type. 12 of them use the memory management API incorrectly and will break if pymalloc is enabled. That's worse than I thought.

Yet believable, given how many reports of "pymalloc failures" we've seen over the last couple years.

I choose to look at the bright side: all the modules you listed used some way to spell "get memory" when getting memory, and some way to spell "release memory" when releasing memory. We can deduce from that exactly how much users can keep straight .