Accessing dynamically allocated arrays on device (without passing them as kernel arguments) - memory-management

Question

How can an array of structs that has been dynamically allocated on the host be used by a kernel, without passing the array of structs as a kernel argument? This seems like a common procedure with a good amount of documentation online, yet it doesn't work on the following program.
Note: Please note that the following questions have been studied before posting this question:
1) copying host memory to cuda __device__ variable 2) Global variable in CUDA 3) Is there any way to dynamically allocate constant memory? CUDA
So far, unsuccessful attempts have been made to:
Dynamically allocate array of structs with cudaMalloc(), then
Use cudaMemcpyToSymbol() with the pointer returned from cudaMalloc() to copy to a __device__ variable which can be used by the kernel.
Code attempt:
NBody.cu (error checking using cudaStatus has mostly been omitted for better readability, and function to read data from file into dynamic array removed):
#include "cuda_runtime.h"
#include "device_launch_parameters.h"
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#define BLOCK 256
struct nbody {
float x, y, vx, vy, m;
};
typedef struct nbody nbody;
// Global declarations
nbody* particle;
// Device variables
__device__ unsigned int d_N; // Kernel can successfully access this
__device__ nbody d_particle; // Update: part of problem was here with (*)
// Aim of kernel: to print contents of array of structs without using kernel argument
__global__ void step_cuda_v1() {
int i = threadIdx.x + blockDim.x * blockIdx.x;
if (i < d_N) {
printf("%.f\n", d_particle.x);
}
}
int main() {
unsigned int N = 10;
unsigned int I = 1;
cudaMallocHost((void**)&particle, N * sizeof(nbody)); // Host allocation
cudaError_t cudaStatus;
for (int i = 0; i < N; i++) particle[i].x = i;
nbody* particle_buf; // device buffer
cudaSetDevice(0);
cudaMalloc((void**)&particle_buf, N * sizeof(nbody)); // Allocate device mem
cudaMemcpy(particle_buf, particle, N * sizeof(nbody), cudaMemcpyHostToDevice); // Copy data into device mem
cudaMemcpyToSymbol(d_particle, &particle_buf, sizeof(nbody*)); // Copy pointer to data into __device__ var
cudaMemcpyToSymbol(d_N, &N, sizeof(unsigned int)); // This works fine
int NThreadBlock = (N + BLOCK - 1) / BLOCK;
for (int iteration = 0; iteration <= I; iteration++) {
step_cuda_v1 << <NThreadBlock, BLOCK >> > ();
//step_cuda_v1 << <1, 5 >> > (particle_buf);
cudaDeviceSynchronize();
cudaStatus = cudaGetLastError();
if (cudaStatus != cudaSuccess)
{
fprintf(stderr, "ERROR: %s\n", cudaGetErrorString(cudaStatus));
exit(-1);
}
}
return 0;
}
OUTPUT:
"ERROR: kernel launch failed."
Summary:
How can I print the contents of the array of structs from the kernel, without passing it as a kernel argument?
Coding in C using VS2019 with CUDA 10.2

Answer 1

With the help of #Robert Crovella and #talonmies, here is the solution that outputs a sequence that cycles from 0 to 9 repeatedly.
#include "cuda_runtime.h"
#include "device_launch_parameters.h"
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#define BLOCK 256
//#include "Nbody.h"
struct nbody {
float x, y, vx, vy, m;
};
typedef struct nbody nbody;
// Global declarations
nbody* particle;
// Device variables
__device__ unsigned int d_N; // Kernel can successfully access this
__device__ nbody* d_particle;
//__device__ nbody d_particle; // Update: part of problem was here with (*)
// Aim of kernel: to print contents of array of structs without using kernel argument
__global__ void step_cuda_v1() {
int i = threadIdx.x + blockDim.x * blockIdx.x;
if (i < d_N) {
printf("%.f\n", d_particle[i].x);
}
}
int main() {
unsigned int N = 10;
unsigned int I = 1;
cudaMallocHost((void**)&particle, N * sizeof(nbody)); // Host allocation
cudaError_t cudaStatus;
for (int i = 0; i < N; i++) particle[i].x = i;
nbody* particle_buf; // device buffer
cudaSetDevice(0);
cudaMalloc((void**)&particle_buf, N * sizeof(nbody)); // Allocate device mem
cudaMemcpy(particle_buf, particle, N * sizeof(nbody), cudaMemcpyHostToDevice); // Copy data into device mem
cudaMemcpyToSymbol(d_particle, &particle_buf, sizeof(nbody*)); // Copy pointer to data into __device__ var
cudaMemcpyToSymbol(d_N, &N, sizeof(unsigned int)); // This works fine
int NThreadBlock = (N + BLOCK - 1) / BLOCK;
for (int iteration = 0; iteration <= I; iteration++) {
step_cuda_v1 << <NThreadBlock, BLOCK >> > ();
//step_cuda_v1 << <1, 5 >> > (particle_buf);
cudaDeviceSynchronize();
cudaStatus = cudaGetLastError();
if (cudaStatus != cudaSuccess)
{
fprintf(stderr, "ERROR: %s\n", cudaGetErrorString(cudaStatus));
exit(-1);
}
}
return 0;
}