Instrumenting Redis for Structural Leak Detection: A jemalloc Deep Dive

Instrumented Redis 7.2 with drainability profiling to measure jemalloc slab fragmentation. Found critical asymmetric accounting bug, fixed with symmetric fastpath instrumentation. Final result: deleting 50% of keys freed 195K objects but achieved 0% drainability - genuine structural fragmentation detected and validated.

February 20, 2026 · map[name:Blackwell Systems]

Structural Memory Leaks: Binary Outcomes in Coarse-Grained Reclamation

Memory grows unbounded. Valgrind shows zero leaks. Research proves coarse-grained allocators have a binary asymptotic outcome: satisfy drainability for O(1) retention, violate it for Ω(t) growth. No middle ground.

February 16, 2026 · map[name:Blackwell Systems]