Multidimensional arrays allocated through calloc

Question

I have a question about how memory is allocated when I calloc. I had a look at this question, but it doesn't address how memory is allocated in the case of a dynamically allocated two dimensional array.

I was wondering if there was a difference in the memory representation between the following three ways of dynamically allocating a 2D array.

Type 1:

double  **array1;
int ii;

array1 = calloc(10, sizeof(double *));
for(ii = 0; ii < 10; ii++) { 
   array1[ii] = calloc(10, sizeof(double));
}
// Then access array elements like array1[ii][jj]

Type 2:

double  **array1;
int ii;

array1 = calloc(10 * 10, sizeof(double *));
// Then access array elements like array1[ii + 10*jj]

Type 3:

double  **array1;
int ii;

array1 = malloc(10 * 10, sizeof(double *));
// Then access array elements like array1[ii + 10*jj]

From what I understand of calloc and malloc, the difference between the last two is that calloc will zero all the elements of the array, whereas malloc will not. But are the first two ways of defining the array equivalent in memory?

Answer 1

Are the first two ways of defining the array equivalent in memory?

Not quite. In the second type they are almost certainly contiguous, while in the first type this is not sure.

Type 1: in-memory representation will look like this:

          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
    double| 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |   
          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ 
            ^
            |------------------------------------                                     
                .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   |    // ten rows of doubles
                                                -
          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--|+
    double| 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0||   
          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--|+
            ^   .   .   .                       -
            |   ^   ^   ^   .   .   .   .   .   |
            |   |   |   |   ^   ^   ^   ^   ^   |
          +-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+
array1[ii]| 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | // each cell points to ten doubles
          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
            ^
            |
            |
          +-|-+
    array1| | |
          +---+

Type 2: in-memory representation will look like this:

          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+     +---+
    double| 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ... | 0 |  
          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+     +---+
            ^   ^   ^   ^   ^   ^   ^   ^   ^   ^         ^
            |   |   |   |   |   |   |   |   |   |         |
            |   |   |   |   |   |   |   |   |   |         |
          +-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+-|-+     +-|-+
array1[ii]| 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | ... |99 | // each cell points to one double
          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+     +---+
            ^
            |
            |
          +-|-+
    array1| | |
          +---+