Allocate memory 2d array in function C

Question

How to allocate dynamic memory for 2d array in function ? I tried this way:

int main()
{
  int m=4,n=3;
  int** arr;
  allocate_mem(&arr,n,m);
}


void allocate_mem(int*** arr,int n, int m)
{
  *arr=(int**)malloc(n*sizeof(int*));
  for(int i=0;i<n;i++)
    *arr[i]=(int*)malloc(m*sizeof(int));
} 

But it doesn't work.

Answer 1

I have tried the following code for allocating memory to 2 dimensional array.

    #include<stdio.h>
    #include<malloc.h>
    void main(void)
    {
    int **p;//double pointer holding a 2d array
    int i,j;
    for(i=0;i<3;i++)
    {
    p=(int**)(malloc(sizeof(int*)));//memory allocation for double pointer
    for(j=(3*i+1);j<(3*i+4);j++)
    {
    *p = (int*)(malloc(sizeof(int)));//memory allocation for pointer holding integer array
    **p = j;                  
    printf(" %d",**p);//print integers in a row 
    printf("\n");
    p++;
    }
    }
    }

Output of the above code is:-

1 2 3

4 5 6

7 8 9

In order to understand 2 dimensional array in terms of pointers, we need to understand how it will be allocated in memory, it should be something like this:-

                1    2    3
    1000 -->   100  104  108

                4    5    6
    1004 -->   200  204  208

                7    8    9
    1008 -->   300  304  308 

from the above, we understand that, when we allocate memory to pointer p which is a double pointer, it is pointing to an array of integers, so in this example, we see that the 0x1000 is pointer p.

This pointer is pointing to integer pointer *p which is array of integers, when memory is allocated inside the inner for loop, during first iteration the pointer is 0x100 which is pointing to integer value 1, when we assign **p = j. Similarly it will be pointing to 2 and 3 in the next iterations in the loop.

Before the next iteration of the outer loop, double pointer is incremented, inside the next iteration, as is seen in this example the pointer is now at 0x1004 and is pointing to integer pointer which is an array of integers 4,5,6 and similarly for the next iterations in the loop.

Answer 2

Rather allocating the memory in many different block, one can allocate this in a consecutive block of memory. Do the following:

int** my2DAllocation(int rows,int columns)
{
   int i;
   int header= rows *sizeof(int *);
   int data=rows*cols*sizeof(int);
   int ** rowptr=(int **)malloc(header+data);
   if(rowptr==NULL)
   {
      return NULL:
   }
   int * buf=(int*)(rowptr+rows);
   for(i=0;i<rows;i++)
   {
      rowptr[i]=buf+i*cols;
   } 
   return rowptr;
}