How to implement guide with `malloc` returning null when allocating large memory blocks in c on macos 13
I'm testing a new approach and I just started working with I'm writing unit tests and I'm working with an scenario where `malloc` consistently returns NULL when I attempt to allocate a large memory block, specifically around 1GB, in a C program running on macOS 13... I am trying to implement a simple memory-intensive application that processes large datasets and needs to allocate substantial amounts of memory. Here’s a snippet of my code: ```c #include <stdio.h> #include <stdlib.h> int main() { size_t size = 1024 * 1024 * 1024; // 1GB char *buffer = (char *)malloc(size); if (buffer == NULL) { perror("Memory allocation failed"); return EXIT_FAILURE; } // Processing code... free(buffer); return EXIT_SUCCESS; } ``` When I run this code, I get the behavior message: `Memory allocation failed: want to allocate memory`. I’ve verified that there’s enough free memory available on my system. I’ve tried adjusting the allocation size, checking for memory fragmentation, and even running the program with elevated permissions using `sudo`, but the scenario continues. Additionally, I noticed that smaller allocations (e.g., 512MB) work without scenario. I also made sure to check the return value of `malloc` directly after calling it. Is there a specific limit or setting in macOS that might be affecting the ability to allocate larger memory blocks? Any advice on how to troubleshoot this further would be greatly appreciated! I'm working on a application that needs to handle this. Thanks in advance! This is my first time working with C 3.11. Any feedback is welcome! My development environment is Linux. Any advice would be much appreciated. For context: I'm using C on macOS. What would be the recommended way to handle this?