Dynamic analysis with Valgrind

Valgrind (https://www.valgrind.org) is an *nix instrumentation framework for building dynamic analysis utilities, which means it performs analysis during a program’s runtime. It comes with a wide range of tools for various types of investigations and checks. Some of the tools include:

• Memcheck: detects memory management problems
• Cachegrind: profiles CPU caches, and identifies cache misses and other issues
• Callgrind: an extension of Cachegrind that provides extra information on call graphs
• Massif: a heap profiler that shows how different parts of the program use the heap over time
• Helgrind: a thread debugger for data race issues
• DRD: a lighter, more limited version of Helgrind

Each tool on this list is highly useful when the situation calls for it. Most system package managers know Valgrind and can install it on your OS with ease. If you’re using Linux, it may already be installed. Additionally...