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Software Engineering vocabulary · Debugging and Troubleshooting

Use-after-free

Meaning in software engineering, with examples

nounAdvanced term

In software engineering, use-after-free means: Accessing a memory region after it has been released, when it is no longer valid for the original object.

In Turkish: serbest bırakma sonrası kullanım

How it is used

Used in memory diagnostics and security reports. It differs from a leak, where memory remains allocated unnecessarily.

Example sentences

  1. The sanitizer reported a use-after-free when the callback read the destroyed session.

    The callback outlived the object whose memory it still tried to read.

  2. Cancelling the pending task fixed the use-after-free during window closure.

    The task could no longer access resources already released by the closing window.

Common collocations

  • detect a use-after-free
  • use-after-free vulnerability
  • pointerA value that refers to a memory location, allowing code to access an object or data stored at that location.
  • destructorA special operation associated with the end of an object's lifetime, commonly used to release resources owned by that object.

More terms: Debugging and Troubleshooting

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