A Memory Leak occurs when a program fails to release memory that is no longer needed. This defect in memory management leads to increased memory usage over time. As a result, the program consumes more resources than necessary.
Key Characteristics:
- Unreleased Memory: Memory allocated but not freed after use.
- Resource Exhaustion: Continual allocation can lead to system slowdowns or crashes.
- Difficult Diagnosis: Often requires source code access to identify.
Consequences of Memory Leaks:
- Performance Degradation: Slower application performance due to increased memory usage.
- System Instability: Can cause applications or systems to crash when memory is exhausted.
- Long-Term Issues: More critical in long-running applications like servers.
Preventing memory leaks involves careful coding practices, such as ensuring that all allocated memory is properly deallocated after use.