Expert C++ Programming

A major limitation with dynamic analysis tools is that they require tight integration with the host operating system. This is the primary reason why Valgrind is focused on POSIX threads, and does not currently work on Windows.

The Valgrind website (at http://valgrind.org/info/platforms.html) describes the issue as follows:

"Windows is not under consideration because porting to it would require so many changes it would almost be a separate project. (However, Valgrind + Wine can be made to work with some effort.) Also, non-open-source OSes are difficult to deal with; being able to see the OS and associated (libc) source code makes things much easier. However, Valgrind is quite usable in conjunction with Wine, which means that it is possible to run Windows programs under Valgrind with some effort."

Basically, this means that Windows applications can be debugged with Valgrind under Linux with some difficulty, but using Windows as the OS won't happen any time soon.

Valgrind does work on OS X/macOS, starting with OS X 10.8 (Mountain Lion). Support for the latest version of macOS may be somewhat incomplete due to changes made by Apple, however. As with the Linux version of Valgrind, it's generally best to always use the latest version of Valgrind. As with gdb, use the distro's package manager, or a third-party one like Homebrew on MacOS.

Table of Contents for
Expert C++ Programming

Limitations

Table of Contents for Expert C++ Programming

Table of Contents for
Expert C++ Programming