alloca() causing SEGFAULT in gnu-make

[saju.pillai]

Hi,

 I got a segfault while using 'make' to zip close to 78,000 Java class
files. Memory allocation was failing during dependency calculations...
Iam including my analysis here .....

The error message :

  Finished dependencies of target file `1808429/j1808429.zip'.
    Must remake target `1808429/j1808429.zip'.
Got a SIGCHLD; 1 unreaped children.
Reaping losing child 0x0005b190 PID 8859
gmake: *** [manager] Segmentation Fault
Removing child 0x0005b190 PID 8859  from chain.
  Failed to remake target file `manager'.
 Finished prerequisites of target file `default'.
Giving up on target file `default'.
gmake: Target `default' not remade because of errors.

-- analysis --

$> make -v
GNU Make version 3.76.1
$> uname -a
SunOS ap555sun 5.6 Generic_105181-16 sun4u sparc SUNW,Ultra-80

The segmentation fault was happening when  alloca() was failing to
allocate enough memory on the stack. ( I need close to 8MB for the 78000
filenames )

The code where we are tripping is ...

file          : commands.c
function      : void set_file_variables(register struct file *)
line numbers  : 140 - 184 ( segfault in 184 )

>>>>>
    /* Compute first the value for $+, which is supposed to contain
      duplicate dependencies as they were listed in the makefile.  */

    for (d = file->deps; d != 0; d = d->next)
      plus_len += strlen (dep_name (d))+ 1;
    len = plus_len == 0 ? 1 : plus_len;

    cp = plus_value = (char *) alloca(len);
    qmark_len = plus_len;

--- code ---
--- code ---

  /* Compute the values for $^ and $?.*/

    cp = caret_value = plus_value;        /* Reuse the buffer; it's big
enough.  */
    len = qmark_len == 0 ? 1 : qmark_len;
    qp = qmark_value = (char *) alloca(len);  /* -- THIS line trips -- */

<<<<<<   -- Here  len = 8MB

The segmentation fault is happening because alloca() fails to allocate the
requested memory and segfaults ( i think this is a known bug with alloca
).

 Should I use malloc() here instead of alloca()? I could free() just
before function exists. But I am not sure if malloc() will affect in any
adverse way.

I could change my makefile and break up the monster targets into smaller
ones, but these are automatically created makefiles and to change it will
not be an easy task :-(

What would you guy's suggest ?

Cheers
srp