[randomguy1254]

Nice article. Minor gripe about the static vs dynamic memory section. The requirement that the data sizes be known at compile-time for static memory (with the example of an array allocated to a user-inputted size), seems to be based on a past restriction of the C language. C has since remove the requirement that stack-based arrays are sized with a compile-time constant; there is nothing at the hardware/assembly level which prevents such arrays. So these stack-based non-compile-time-sized arrays don't fit into either the static or dynamic memory categories presented here.

[phyllostachys]

I was bothered by saying that static memory is assigned on the stack (implied that it is only on the stack). As an embedded guy, at least in bare metal situations, local function statics, any const variables, and any globals are either in the read-only data section[1] or in the general data section[2], both before the heap and definitely not in the stack section.

[1] - .rodata section in gcc

[2] - I think this is in the .data and .bss sections, where .data is copied from the file and .bss is zero initialized before calling main by the crt. If you peak into a linker script, or dump one by passing --verbose to ld, you can even see where it puts all the C++ bits and pieces. A dump I did on Debian with g++ is here: https://gist.github.com/Phyllostachys/0682a3bda13ef9c6b49d04...

[phyllostachys]

After looking at that default linker script dump, I noticed it didn't have the stuff I saw in the ARM linker script that I'm used to. So I attached one for a Silicon Labs EFM32 part. It's below the x86-64 linker script and is a little easier to read.

[phyllostachys]

After a little investigation[1][2], it seems things get weird with an OS, as would be expected with virtual memory, et al.

[1] - https://stackoverflow.com/questions/16360620/find-out-whethe...

[2] - http://duartes.org/gustavo/blog/post/anatomy-of-a-program-in...

[kahlonel]

Except for the fact that the arrays you are talking about are still put on the stack.

[randomguy1254]

Apologies if unclear, that is what I meant be stack-based. Article implies that you cannot create a dynamically sized object on the stack.