Why is the use of alloca() not considered good practice?

Question

alloca() allocates memory on the stack rather than on the heap, as in the case of malloc(). So, when I return from the routine the memory is freed.

Answer 1

I don't think anyone has mentioned this: Use of alloca in a function will hinder or disable some optimizations that could otherwise be applied in the function, since the compiler cannot know the size of the function's stack frame.

For instance, a common optimization by C compilers is to eliminate use of the frame pointer within a function, frame accesses are made relative to the stack pointer instead; so there's one more register for general use. But if alloca is called within the function, the difference between sp and fp will be unknown for part of the function, so this optimization cannot be done.

Given the rarity of its use, and its shady status as a standard function, compiler designers quite possibly disable any optimization that might cause trouble with alloca, if would take more than a little effort to make it work with alloca.

UPDATE: Since variable-length local arrays have been added to C, and since these present very similar code-generation issues to the compiler as alloca, I see that 'rarity of use and shady status' does not apply to the underlying mechanism; but I would still suspect that use of either alloca or VLA tends to compromise code generation within a function that uses them. I would welcome any feedback from compiler designers.