I'm unsure what the problem running this is. I know that if I remove the second for loop (where it is supposed to free the inner array), it runs fine.
int main(void)
{
int i;
char *board = malloc(sizeof(char *) * 8);
for (i=0; i<8; i++)
board[i] = malloc(sizeof(char *) * 8);
for (i=0; i<8; i++)
free(board[i]);
free(board);
return 0;
}
The variable board is a pointer to char, i.e. much like a string. That means each "element" in board is a single character and not a pointer.
That means when you in the loop do
board[i] = malloc(sizeof(char *) * 8);
you will assign a pointer to a char, and not a char *.
You want to make board a pointer to pointers to char:
char **board = malloc(...)
Oh and by the way, you are allocating more than 8 characters for each string in the loop. You are allocating memory for 8 pointers. You should do e.g.
board[i] = malloc(sizeof(char) * 8);
Or, since sizeof(char) is always equal to 1
board[i] = malloc(8);
Furthermore, and I don't know if this applies to you, but remember that strings in C have a special terminator character at the end. So if you want a string of eight characters you need to make space for nine characters.