Valgrind massif - measure total memory allocations per callstack

Question

I record memory allocations using valgrind massif and use ms_print to create a document of snapshots that shows me which callstack holds how much memory currently, right?

I want to measure which callstacks have allocated most over the whole program run, that means deallocated memory should be taken into account when calculating the weight of a callstack.

Is this possible?

Regards

Answer 1

When a tool (such as memcheck, massif, ...) replaces the memory allocation functions (malloc, free, ...), then valgrind provides the option:

--xtree-memory=none|allocs|full   profile heap memory in an xtree [none]
                          and produces a report at the end of the execution
                          none: no profiling, allocs: current allocated
                          size/blocks, full: profile current and cumulative
                          allocated size/blocks and freed size/blocks.
--xtree-memory-file=<file>   xtree memory report file [xtmemory.kcg.%p]

So, if you use --xtree-memory=full, you will get a file that you can visualise with kcachegrind. The resulting file details a.o. what is currently allocated, and what was allocated and then freed.

See http://www.valgrind.org/docs/manual/manual-core.html#manual-core.xtree for more details.