Segmentation fault when converting char * to char ** - c

Question

I'm trying to split a sentence (char *) to an array of words (char **). The problem is that my function that does just that sometimes doesn't return a valid char **.
char **get_words(char *buffer, char delimiter)
{
char **words = malloc(sizeof(char *) * 4096);
for (int i = 0; i < 4096; i++)
words[i] = malloc(sizeof(char) * 4096);
int word_count = 0;
int l = 0;
for (int i = 0; buffer[i] != '\0' && buffer[i] != '\n'; i++, l++) {
if (buffer[i] == delimiter) {
words[word_count][l] = '\0';
word_count++;
l = -1;
}
else
words[word_count][l] = buffer[i];
}
words[word_count][l] = '\0';
return (words);
}
I first use it like this:
char *buffer = malloc(sizeof(char) * 50);
buffer = "/login test\n";
char **words = get_words(buffer, ' ');
printf("Words[0] = %s", words[0]);
And it works fine.
However when I do it the same way with this:
char **reply = get_words("502 Command doesn't exist.\n", ' ')
I can't even print reply[0][0] (see below) without having a segmentation fault.
Moreover, I tried to debug this using valgrind but when I use it the program doesn't crash and everything works so I can't find what's wrong.
printf("Reply[0][0] = %d\n", reply[0][0]);
printf("Reply[0][0] = %c\n", reply[0][0]);
EDIT:
Here is a reproductible example.
#include <unistd.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <assert.h>
char **get_words(char *buffer, char delimiter)
{
printf("buffer = %s\n", buffer);
char **words = malloc(sizeof(char *) * 100);
if (words == NULL) {
printf("Malloc Error\n");
exit(84);
}
for (int i = 0; i < 100; i++) {
words[i] = malloc(sizeof(char) * 100);
if (words[i] == NULL) {
printf("Malloc Error\n");
exit(84);
}
}
int word_count = 0;
int l = 0;
for (int i = 0; buffer[i] != '\0' && buffer[i] != '\n'; i++, l++) {
if (buffer[i] == delimiter) {
words[word_count][l] = '\0';
word_count++;
l = -1;
}
else
words[word_count][l] = buffer[i];
}
words[word_count][l] = '\0';
return (words);
}
int main()
{
char *buffer = malloc(sizeof(char) * 100);
buffer = "hello world !\n";
char **words = get_words(buffer, ' ');
printf("words[0]= %s\n", words[0]);
free (buffer);
char **reply = get_words("Second call\n", ' ');
printf("reply[0] = %s\n", reply[0]);
}

Answer 1

If you need help in learning programming, you can try a static analyzer. This is a program that performs code reviews and finds suspicious code fragments. Static analyzers can't replace code reviews performed by a teammate. However, analyzers complement code reviews and help find many errors at earliest stages.
Let's run the online version of the PVS-Studio analyzer for the code sample attached to the question. The first interesting and important warning is the following warning: V1031 The malloc function is not declared. Passing data to or from this function can be affected.
Without declaring the malloc function, the program runs in a strange way. According to the C language, if a function is not declared, it returns int. But actually, it's a pointer. You can find out why this is dangerous here. Let's fix this problem by adding #include <stdlib.h>.
Now the analyzer issues another warning — we get a more serious issue:
43:1: note: V773 The 'buffer' pointer was assigned values twice without releasing the memory. A memory leak is possible.
The issue is in the following code fragment:
char *buffer = malloc(sizeof(char) * 100);
buffer = "hello world !\n";
....
free (buffer);
The pointer value is overwritten. To copy a string to the buffer, a programmer should use special functions, for example strcpy. Let's fix this.
Here's the fixed code.
#include <unistd.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <assert.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
char **get_words(char *buffer, char delimiter)
{
printf("buffer = %s\n", buffer);
char **words = malloc(sizeof(char *) * 100);
if (words == NULL) {
printf("Malloc Error\n");
exit(84);
}
for (int i = 0; i < 100; i++) {
words[i] = malloc(sizeof(char) * 100);
if (words[i] == NULL) {
printf("Malloc Error\n");
exit(84);
}
}
int word_count = 0;
int l = 0;
for (int i = 0; buffer[i] != '\0' && buffer[i] != '\n'; i++, l++) {
if (buffer[i] == delimiter) {
words[word_count][l] = '\0';
word_count++;
l = -1;
}
else
words[word_count][l] = buffer[i];
}
words[word_count][l] = '\0';
return (words);
}
int main()
{
char *buffer = malloc(sizeof(char) * 100);
if (buffer == NULL)
exit(84);
strcpy(buffer, "hello world !\n");
char **words = get_words(buffer, ' ');
printf("words[0]= %s\n", words[0]);
free (buffer);
char **reply = get_words("Second call\n", ' ');
printf("reply[0] = %s\n", reply[0]);
}
I can't say that this code is perfect and secure, but it runs. So, using static analyzers to find errors, you can improve your learning process.