Memory leak when using net.newContext()

[tdely]

SslContext from net.newContext() leaks memory when destroyed.

Example

import std/net

proc main() =
  for i in 1 .. 4:
    let ctx = newContext()

main()

Current Output

$ valgrind --leak-check=full ./test
==11241== Memcheck, a memory error detector
==11241== Copyright (C) 2002-2017, and GNU GPL'd, by Julian Seward et al.
==11241== Using Valgrind-3.18.1 and LibVEX; rerun with -h for copyright info
==11241== Command: ./test
==11241==
==11241==
==11241== HEAP SUMMARY:
==11241==     in use at exit: 2,343,489 bytes in 38,896 blocks
==11241==   total heap usage: 103,731 allocs, 64,835 frees, 8,222,641 bytes allocated
==11241==
==11241== 2,337,992 (4,096 direct, 2,333,896 indirect) bytes in 4 blocks are definitely lost in loss record 107 of 107
==11241==    at 0x48397B5: malloc (vg_replace_malloc.c:381)
==11241==    by 0x10AFBD: allocImpl__system_1725 (malloc.nim:5)
==11241==    by 0x115286: allocSharedImpl (malloc.nim:25)
==11241==    by 0x11A9C3: allocWrapper__wrappersZopenssl_578 (openssl.nim:551)
==11241==    by 0x4FB7FE9: CRYPTO_zalloc (in /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libcrypto.so.1.1)
==11241==    by 0x5171FFE: SSL_CTX_new (in /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libssl.so.1.1)
==11241==    by 0x11E5F2: newContext__pureZnet_1234 (net.nim:623)
==11241==    by 0x11FDCD: main__test_2 (test.nim:5)
==11241==    by 0x11FF26: NimMainModule (test.nim:7)
==11241==    by 0x11FF5A: NimMainInner (system.nim:2229)
==11241==    by 0x11FE84: NimMain (system.nim:2237)
==11241==    by 0x11FEA6: main (system.nim:2244)
==11241==
==11241== LEAK SUMMARY:
==11241==    definitely lost: 4,096 bytes in 4 blocks
==11241==    indirectly lost: 2,333,896 bytes in 38,880 blocks
==11241==      possibly lost: 0 bytes in 0 blocks
==11241==    still reachable: 5,497 bytes in 12 blocks
==11241==         suppressed: 0 bytes in 0 blocks
==11241== Reachable blocks (those to which a pointer was found) are not shown.
==11241== To see them, rerun with: --leak-check=full --show-leak-kinds=all
==11241==
==11241== For lists of detected and suppressed errors, rerun with: -s
==11241== ERROR SUMMARY: 1 errors from 1 contexts (suppressed: 0 from 0)

Additional Information

It's possible to work around this by using {.threadvar.} and not recreating the SslContext, like the default context is handled in the httpclient module: this should work in most cases. It won't work where the context needs to change, such as a configuration reload to use a new certificate and private key.

$ nim -v
Nim Compiler Version 1.6.4 [Linux: amd64]
Compiled at 2022-02-09
Copyright (c) 2006-2021 by Andreas Rumpf

git hash: 7994556f3804c217035c44b453a3feec64405758
active boot switches: -d:release

[ghost]

This is not really a memory leak, SslContext doesn't have a default destructor/finalizer, so you're supposed to call destroyContext manually:

import std/net

proc main() =
  for i in 1 .. 4:
    let ctx = newContext()
    ctx.destroyContext()

main()

Gives:

==205161== HEAP SUMMARY:
==205161==     in use at exit: 3,333 bytes in 9 blocks
==205161==   total heap usage: 177,623 allocs, 177,614 frees, 15,643,420 bytes allocated
==205161== 
==205161== LEAK SUMMARY:
==205161==    definitely lost: 0 bytes in 0 blocks
==205161==    indirectly lost: 0 bytes in 0 blocks
==205161==      possibly lost: 0 bytes in 0 blocks
==205161==    still reachable: 3,333 bytes in 9 blocks
==205161==         suppressed: 0 bytes in 0 blocks

So, this issue is either about:

1. Adding a default destructor to SslContext
2. Adding a reference to destroyContext in the docs to newContext