I never had the use case to allocate 0 bytes of memory. If I would allocate 0 by... | Hacker News

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randomNumber7 on June 26, 2025 | parent | context | favorite | on: Some bits on malloc(0) in C being allowed to retur...

I never had the use case to allocate 0 bytes of memory.

If I would allocate 0 bytes of memory and get a pointer to it, I wouldn't care what the value of the pointer is since I am not allowed to dereference it anyways.

But then again, why would I allocate 0 bytes of memory?

bobmcnamara on June 27, 2025 | [–]

Sometimes it shakes out simpler for a generic container.

Ex: a vector using only a counter and pointer - you can use realloc() with fewer pointer validity checks.

corysama on June 27, 2025 | [–]

Some folks used it as a per-run, internal GUID generator. Not saying that's a good use. But, it was done.

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