Core Dump
ELI5 — The Vibe Check
A core dump is a snapshot of a program's memory at the moment it crashed — the crime scene photo of a software death. It captures everything: variables, stack traces, heap data. Developers use it to investigate what went wrong, like a forensic detective analyzing evidence. The name comes from 'magnetic core memory' — ancient history, but the term stuck.
Real Talk
A core dump is a file containing the recorded state of a program's working memory at the time of a crash (typically a segfault or unhandled signal). It includes the call stack, register values, and heap/stack contents. Debuggers like GDB can load core dumps to reconstruct the program state at the crash point. Core dumps can be large and may contain sensitive data.
Show Me The Code
# Enable core dumps
ulimit -c unlimited
# Run program that crashes
./my_program
# Segmentation fault (core dumped)
# Analyze with GDB
gdb ./my_program core
(gdb) bt # backtrace shows where it crashed
When You'll Hear This
"Check the core dump — it'll show exactly where the segfault happened." / "Core dumps are disabled in production for security — enable them temporarily to debug."
Related Terms
Debug
Debugging is the process of finding and fixing the gremlins in your code. Something is broken, and you need to play detective — adding clues (console.
Memory Leak
A memory leak is when your program keeps grabbing more memory but never gives it back, like filling a bathtub without a drain.
Segfault
A segfault (segmentation fault) is what happens when a program tries to access memory it's not allowed to touch — like trying to walk into someone else's h...
Stack Trace
A stack trace is the error report that tells you exactly which functions were called right before your code crashed.