octave-3.0.3 crashes while executing 'expfit' ("free(): invalid pointer")

[Sergei Steshenko]

--- On Wed, 12/24/08, Sergei Steshenko <sergstesh at yahoo.com> wrote:

> From: Sergei Steshenko <sergstesh at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: octave-3.0.3 crashes while executing 'expfit' ("free(): invalid pointer")
> To: "John W. Eaton" <jwe at octave.org>
> Cc: bug-octave at octave.org
> Date: Wednesday, December 24, 2008, 5:28 PM
> --- On Wed, 12/24/08, John W. Eaton <jwe at octave.org>
[snip]
> 
> My wild guess there is 'new'/'malloc'
> somewhere which doesn't check pointer
> for NULL; on a 64 bits system memory allocation error is
> less likely than
> on a 32 bits system.
> 
> The wild guess is based on the fact that peak memory
> consumption is about
> 2G.
> 
> Thanks,
>   Sergei.

A probably better guess would be that it's some kind of integer index overflow.

I.e. the index is integer and not unsigned, and when it crosses the 2G
limit it becomes negative.

Thanks,
  Sergei.