# haxe-ui
- r
rhythmic-librarian-79625
12/02/2021, 10:25 PMFor what I've seen the Pointer class seems to be a safe wrapper around C pointers - r
rhythmic-librarian-79625
12/02/2021, 10:25 PMBut the standard library doesn't say anything about them. It would be nice to have a comparison between them - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:27 PMi wrote the initial PoC for, what is now, hxRayLib (just as a test, just as a play around)... i didnt really want to have that project "outside my control" so i remade the bindings "as i would use them" (raylib-haxe) - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:27 PMRawPointer will turn into, well, a raw pointer (not a cpp template) - r
rhythmic-librarian-79625
12/02/2021, 10:31 PMSo a Pointer class is a safe wrapper around C++ pointers right? Then what's the reason to use Star and ConstStar? (I mean in general when using hxcpp) - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:32 PMsafe in what sense? Its just a cpp template around a pointer... i wouldnt call it safe, you can certainly leak them - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:32 PMits not like a smart pointer or something (if thats what you are thinking) - r
rhythmic-librarian-79625
12/02/2021, 10:32 PMSorry, maybe type safe is a better term? I'm new to haxe - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:33 PMit is a managed pointer though (i think - to a degree) - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:33 PMhmmm, i guess its type safe, but so is RawPointer, its just that a RawPointer will turn into (in the transpiled cpp) a "void *" - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:34 PMso its "perfect" to for interacting with external cpp libs - r
rhythmic-librarian-79625
12/02/2021, 10:34 PMBut can't I just do something like
then?Pointer<cpp.Void> - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:34 PMnot if you want to pass that to an external lib - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:34 PMyou can reinterp_cast it to a raw - r
rhythmic-librarian-79625
12/02/2021, 10:36 PMI'm trying to understand the differences between these classes because I'm creating externs for another library but the standard library doesn't help sadly I've noticed that
is essentiallyStar
right?Null<T> - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:37 PMim not sure about Star, but likely that used as a placholder for the hxcpp generator - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:37 PMmore likely the generator will produce "char *" from it - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:39 PMnot exactly, thats a pain... - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:39 PMits kinda arse about face there - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:40 PMint cpp&t[] == *t - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:40 PMso a pointer is fine - r
rhythmic-librarian-79625
12/02/2021, 10:41 PMArgh, I need to create an extern class for a struct that has a field which is a char[20] - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:41 PMchar* == char[20] (kinda) - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:41 PMi mean, ish, not really, but "fine" - r
rhythmic-librarian-79625
12/02/2021, 10:42 PMSo I could just use a StarChar - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:42 PMdo you need to allocate the char[20]? - b
bright-gpu-74537
12/02/2021, 10:42 PMwhats the function signature of the cpp function?