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Dev-C++ Modernized With Powerful New FastMM5 Memory Manager For Delphi

Embarcadero Dev-C++ is an open source C/C++ IDE project built in Delphi. Dev-C++ has been downloaded over 67 MILLON times since 2000 and a modernization effort was sponsored by Embarcadero to bring it up to the latest version of Delphi. The original version by Bloodshed software was originally built in Delphi 6 and then probably upgraded to Delphi 7. A newer unofficial fork called Orwell Dev-C++ continued upgrading the project in Delphi 7 but the last release was in 2015. The Orwell fork of Dev-C++ uses the custom FastMM4 4.991 memory manager which came out in 2012. There is a newer version of FastMM4 4.992 which came out in 2016.

FastMM4 is a memory manager for Delphi by Pierre le Riche. It is available under both an MPL and LGPL license. Delphi actually ships with a custom version of FastMM4 and there is a discussion over on Delphi-PRAXiS about the differences between the two. FastMM4 is described as “A fast replacement memory manager for Embarcadero Delphi applications that scales well under multi-threaded usage, is not prone to memory fragmentation, and supports shared memory without the use of external .DLL files.” Some of it’s advantages are listed as:

In 2020, developer Pierre le Riche released a complete rewrite of FastMM4 called FastMM5. As part of the Dev-C++ modernization effort we upgraded the memory manager in it from FastMM4 to FastMM5. FastMM5 is available under a GPL and commercial license. This means that it can be used with another GPL project or a commercial license can be purchased to use it with your projects. It is described as “Version 5 is a complete rewrite of FastMM. It is designed from the ground up to simultaneously keep the strengths and address the shortcomings of version 4.992“. The differences between FastMM5 and FastMM4 are listed as:

The latest version of Embarcadero Dev-C++ (version 6) is now available with the new FastMM5 memory manager in place. A number of other enhancements are also available in the new version like an upgraded compiler (TDM GCC 9.2.0) which supports C++17 and partial C++20.

Head over and check out the full source code for the FastMM5 memory manager over on GitHub.

Head over and check out the full source code for the Embarcadero sponsored version of Dev-C++ with the new memory manager.

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