Dear C and C++ standards discussion groups,

My name is Niall Douglas, and I am the author of a popular third-party
memory allocator called nedmalloc (http://www.nedprod.com/programs/
portable/nedmalloc/). I would like to solicit your feedback on
enhancing
the malloc C API to remove a lot of latency and memory bandwidth waste
in
contemporary memory allocation. I have written up a standards change
proposal for the C standard library and a further one for the C++ STL.
I
have placed these texts with notes and the changed sections in red
highlighting at http://mallocv2.wordpress.com/ where anyone can
comment
and vote upon aspects of the proposed changes. My hope is that by the
15th
October we have a general consensus on a proposal text which can be
submitted into the C1X process or failing that, into a library
standards
change revision shortly thereafter.

I have done my best to make the proposals both easy for programmers to
work with and open to future and/or third party extension, while
keeping
the burden of implementation low and any ripples outward and therefore
unintended consequences low. This means that the proposals are not
ideal
nor perfect, but try to work with existing practice. Both proposals
have
already been implemented in working code, and they work well (in my
opinion).

I can tell you already from initial consultation with experts in the
field that these proposals are controversial with widely differing
points of view on what should be done and how it should be done. I
believe however that none of these problems are insurmountable, and I
look
forward to reading your thoughts on these matters.


Quick shortcuts:

Why this proposal is important: http://mallocv2.wordpress.com/

The C proposal text with notes:
http://mallocv2.wordpress.com/the-c-proposal-text/

The C++ proposal text with notes:
http://mallocv2.wordpress.com/the-cpp-proposal-text/


About my background shortcuts:

My CV: http://www.nedprod.com/xmlcv/interactivecv.html.

My personal website: http://www.nedprod.com/

My professional website: http://www.nedproductions.biz/.


I would suggest you place any replies on the website via its threaded
commenting system rather than here such that later commentators from a
non-language theoretical viewpoint can track discussions. Those
interested
in monitoring comments on the website should note that like all
Wordpress
sites, it exports itself as RSS and therefore can be subscribed to.

I would also appreciate if you would forward this message to anyone
you think interested. In particular, I have failed to find working
email addresses for the memory allocator guys at Google and Microsoft
-
those responsible for the allocators in Mac OS X, Solaris, BSD and
Linux
already know of this proposal.

My thanks in advance for your time,
Niall Douglas

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