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=pod
LuaJIT
=head1 FFI Semantics
=over
=item * LuaJIT
=over
=item * Download E<rchevron>
=item * Installation
=item * Running
=back
=item * Extensions
=over
=item * FFI Library
=over
=item * FFI Tutorial
=item * ffi.* API
=item * FFI Semantics
=back
=item * jit.* Library
=item * Lua/C API
=item * Profiler
=back
=item * Status
=over
=item * Changes
=back
=item * FAQ
=item * Performance E<rchevron>
=item * Wiki E<rchevron>
=item * Mailing List E<rchevron>
=back
This page describes the detailed semantics underlying the FFI library
and its interaction with both Lua and C code.
Given that the FFI library is designed to interface with C code and
that declarations can be written in plain C syntax, B<it closely
follows the C language semantics>, wherever possible. Some minor
concessions are needed for smoother interoperation with Lua language
semantics.
Please don't be overwhelmed by the contents of this page E<mdash> this
is a reference and you may need to consult it, if in doubt. It doesn't
hurt to skim this page, but most of the semantics "just work" as you'd
expect them to work. It should be straightforward to write applications
using the LuaJIT FFI for developers with a C or C++ background.
=head2 C Language Support
The FFI library has a built-in C parser with a minimal memory
footprint. It's used by the ffi.* library functions to declare C types
or external symbols.
It's only purpose is to parse C declarations, as found e.g. in C header
files. Although it does evaluate constant expressions, it's I<not> a C
compiler. The body of C<inline> C function definitions is simply
ignored.
Also, this is I<not> a validating C parser. It expects and accepts
correctly formed C declarations, but it may choose to ignore bad
declarations or show rather generic error messages. If in doubt, please
check the input against your favorite C compiler.
The C parser complies to the B<C99 language standard> plus the
following extensions:
=over
=item * The C<'\e'> escape in character and string literals.
=item * The C99/C++ boolean type, declared with the keywords C<bool> or
C<_Bool>.
=item * Complex numbers, declared with the keywords C<complex> or
C<_Complex>.
=item * Two complex number types: C<complex> (aka C<complex double>)
and C<complex float>.
=item * Vector types, declared with the GCC C<mode> or C<vector_size>
attribute.
=item * Unnamed ('transparent') C<struct>/C<union> fields inside a
C<struct>/C<union>.
=item * Incomplete C<enum> declarations, handled like incomplete
C<struct> declarations.
=item * Unnamed C<enum> fields inside a C<struct>/C<union>. This is
similar to a scoped C++ C<enum>, except that declared constants are
visible in the global namespace, too.
=item * Scoped C<static const> declarations inside a C<struct>/C<union>
(from C++).
=item * Zero-length arrays (C<[0]>), empty C<struct>/C<union>,
variable-length arrays (VLA, C<[?]>) and variable-length structs (VLS,
with a trailing VLA).
=item * C++ reference types (C<int &x>).
=item * Alternate GCC keywords with 'C<__>', e.g. C<__const__>.
=item * GCC C<__attribute__> with the following attributes: C<aligned>,
C<packed>, C<mode>, C<vector_size>, C<cdecl>, C<fastcall>, C<stdcall>,
C<thiscall>.
=item * The GCC C<__extension__> keyword and the GCC C<__alignof__>
operator.
=item * GCC C<__asm__("symname")> symbol name redirection for function
declarations.
=item * MSVC keywords for fixed-length types: C<__int8>, C<__int16>,
C<__int32> and C<__int64>.
=item * MSVC C<__cdecl>, C<__fastcall>, C<__stdcall>, C<__thiscall>,
C<__ptr32>, C<__ptr64>, C<__declspec(align(n))> and C<#pragma pack>.
=item * All other GCC/MSVC-specific attributes are ignored.
=back
The following C types are pre-defined by the C parser (like a
C<typedef>, except re-declarations will be ignored):
=over
=item * Vararg handling: C<va_list>, C<__builtin_va_list>,
C<__gnuc_va_list>.
=item * From C<E<lt>stddef.hE<gt>>: C<ptrdiff_t>, C<size_t>,
C<wchar_t>.
=item * From C<E<lt>stdint.hE<gt>>: C<int8_t>, C<int16_t>, C<int32_t>,
C<int64_t>, C<uint8_t>, C<uint16_t>, C<uint32_t>, C<uint64_t>,
C<intptr_t>, C<uintptr_t>.
=item * From C<E<lt>unistd.hE<gt>> (POSIX): C<ssize_t>.
=back
You're encouraged to use these types in preference to compiler-specific
extensions or target-dependent standard types. E.g. C<char> differs in
signedness and C<long> differs in size, depending on the target
architecture and platform ABI.
The following C features are B<not> supported:
=over
=item * A declaration must always have a type specifier; it doesn't
default to an C<int> type.
=item * Old-style empty function declarations (K&R) are not allowed.
All C functions must have a proper prototype declaration. A function
declared without parameters (C<int foo();>) is treated as a function
taking zero arguments, like in C++.
=item * The C<long double> C type is parsed correctly, but there's no
support for the related conversions, accesses or arithmetic operations.
=item * Wide character strings and character literals are not
supported.
=item * See below for features that are currently not implemented.
=back
=head2 C Type Conversion Rules
=head2 Conversions from C types to Lua objects
These conversion rules apply for I<read accesses> to C types: indexing
pointers, arrays or C<struct>/C<union> types; reading external
variables or constant values; retrieving return values from C calls:
Input
Conversion
Output
C<int8_t>, C<int16_t>
E<rarr>sign-ext C<int32_t> E<rarr> C<double>
number
C<uint8_t>, C<uint16_t>
E<rarr>zero-ext C<int32_t> E<rarr> C<double>
number
C<int32_t>, C<uint32_t>
E<rarr> C<double>
number
C<int64_t>, C<uint64_t>
boxed value
64 bit int cdata
C<double>, C<float>
E<rarr> C<double>
number
C<bool>
0 E<rarr> C<false>, otherwise C<true>
boolean
C<enum>
boxed value
enum cdata
Complex number
boxed value
complex cdata
Vector
boxed value
vector cdata
Pointer
boxed value
pointer cdata
Array
boxed reference
reference cdata
C<struct>/C<union>
boxed reference
reference cdata
Bitfields are treated like their underlying type.
Reference types are dereferenced I<before> a conversion can take place
E<mdash> the conversion is applied to the C type pointed to by the
reference.
=head2 Conversions from Lua objects to C types
These conversion rules apply for I<write accesses> to C types: indexing
pointers, arrays or C<struct>/C<union> types; initializing cdata
objects; casts to C types; writing to external variables; passing
arguments to C calls:
Input
Conversion
Output
number
E<rarr>
C<double>
boolean
C<false> E<rarr> 0, C<true> E<rarr> 1
C<bool>
nil
C<NULL> E<rarr>
C<(void *)>
lightuserdata
lightuserdata address E<rarr>
C<(void *)>
userdata
userdata payload E<rarr>
C<(void *)>
io.* file
get FILE * handle E<rarr>
C<(void *)>
string
match against C<enum> constant
C<enum>
string
copy string data + zero-byte
C<int8_t[]>, C<uint8_t[]>
string
string data E<rarr>
C<const char[]>
function
create callback E<rarr>
C function type
table
table initializer
Array
table
table initializer
C<struct>/C<union>
cdata
cdata payload E<rarr>
C type
If the result type of this conversion doesn't match the C type of the
destination, the conversion rules between C types are applied.
Reference types are immutable after initialization ("no re-seating of
references"). For initialization purposes or when passing values to
reference parameters, they are treated like pointers. Note that unlike
in C++, there's no way to implement automatic reference generation of
variables under the Lua language semantics. If you want to call a
function with a reference parameter, you need to explicitly pass a
one-element array.
=head2 Conversions between C types
These conversion rules are more or less the same as the standard C
conversion rules. Some rules only apply to casts, or require pointer or
type compatibility:
Input
Conversion
Output
Signed integer
E<rarr>narrow or sign-extend
Integer
Unsigned integer
E<rarr>narrow or zero-extend
Integer
Integer
E<rarr>round
C<double>, C<float>
C<double>, C<float>
E<rarr>trunc C<int32_t> E<rarr>narrow
C<(u)int8_t>, C<(u)int16_t>
C<double>, C<float>
E<rarr>trunc
C<(u)int32_t>, C<(u)int64_t>
C<double>, C<float>
E<rarr>round
C<float>, C<double>
Number
n == 0 E<rarr> 0, otherwise 1
C<bool>
C<bool>
C<false> E<rarr> 0, C<true> E<rarr> 1
Number
Complex number
convert real part
Number
Number
convert real part, imag = 0
Complex number
Complex number
convert real and imag part
Complex number
Number
convert scalar and replicate
Vector
Vector
copy (same size)
Vector
C<struct>/C<union>
take base address (compat)
Pointer
Array
take base address (compat)
Pointer
Function
take function address
Function pointer
Number
convert via C<uintptr_t> (cast)
Pointer
Pointer
convert address (compat/cast)
Pointer
Pointer
convert address (cast)
Integer
Array
convert base address (cast)
Integer
Array
copy (compat)
Array
C<struct>/C<union>
copy (identical type)
C<struct>/C<union>
Bitfields or C<enum> types are treated like their underlying type.
Conversions not listed above will raise an error. E.g. it's not
possible to convert a pointer to a complex number or vice versa.
=head2 Conversions for vararg C function arguments
The following default conversion rules apply when passing Lua objects
to the variable argument part of vararg C functions:
Input
Conversion
Output
number
E<rarr>
C<double>
boolean
C<false> E<rarr> 0, C<true> E<rarr> 1
C<bool>
nil
C<NULL> E<rarr>
C<(void *)>
userdata
userdata payload E<rarr>
C<(void *)>
lightuserdata
lightuserdata address E<rarr>
C<(void *)>
string
string data E<rarr>
C<const char *>
C<float> cdata
E<rarr>
C<double>
Array cdata
take base address
Element pointer
C<struct>/C<union> cdata
take base address
C<struct>/C<union> pointer
Function cdata
take function address
Function pointer
Any other cdata
no conversion
C type
To pass a Lua object, other than a cdata object, as a specific type,
you need to override the conversion rules: create a temporary cdata
object with a constructor or a cast and initialize it with the value to
pass:
Assuming C<x> is a Lua number, here's how to pass it as an integer to a
vararg function:
ffi.cdef[[
int printf(const char *fmt, ...);
]]
ffi.C.printf("integer value: %d\n", ffi.new("int", x))
If you don't do this, the default Lua number E<rarr> C<double>
conversion rule applies. A vararg C function expecting an integer will
see a garbled or uninitialized value.
=head2 Initializers
Creating a cdata object with C<ffi.new()> or the equivalent constructor
syntax always initializes its contents, too. Different rules apply,
depending on the number of optional initializers and the C types
involved:
=over
=item * If no initializers are given, the object is filled with zero
bytes.
=item * Scalar types (numbers and pointers) accept a single
initializer. The Lua object is converted to the scalar C type.
=item * Valarrays (complex numbers and vectors) are treated like
scalars when a single initializer is given. Otherwise they are treated
like regular arrays.
=item * Aggregate types (arrays and structs) accept either a single
cdata initializer of the same type (copy constructor), a single table
initializer, or a flat list of initializers.
=item * The elements of an array are initialized, starting at index
zero. If a single initializer is given for an array, it's repeated for
all remaining elements. This doesn't happen if two or more initializers
are given: all remaining uninitialized elements are filled with zero
bytes.
=item * Byte arrays may also be initialized with a Lua string. This
copies the whole string plus a terminating zero-byte. The copy stops
early only if the array has a known, fixed size.
=item * The fields of a C<struct> are initialized in the order of their
declaration. Uninitialized fields are filled with zero bytes.
=item * Only the first field of a C<union> can be initialized with a
flat initializer.
=item * Elements or fields which are aggregates themselves are
initialized with a I<single> initializer, but this may be a table
initializer or a compatible aggregate.
=item * Excess initializers cause an error.
=back
=head2 Table Initializers
The following rules apply if a Lua table is used to initialize an Array
or a C<struct>/C<union>:
=over
=item * If the table index C<[0]> is non-C<nil>, then the table is
assumed to be zero-based. Otherwise it's assumed to be one-based.
=item * Array elements, starting at index zero, are initialized
one-by-one with the consecutive table elements, starting at either
index C<[0]> or C<[1]>. This process stops at the first C<nil> table
element.
=item * If exactly one array element was initialized, it's repeated for
all the remaining elements. Otherwise all remaining uninitialized
elements are filled with zero bytes.
=item * The above logic only applies to arrays with a known fixed size.
A VLA is only initialized with the element(s) given in the table.
Depending on the use case, you may need to explicitly add a C<NULL> or
C<0> terminator to a VLA.
=item * A C<struct>/C<union> can be initialized in the order of the
declaration of its fields. Each field is initialized with consecutive
table elements, starting at either index C<[0]> or C<[1]>. This process
stops at the first C<nil> table element.
=item * Otherwise, if neither index C<[0]> nor C<[1]> is present, a
C<struct>/C<union> is initialized by looking up each field name (as a
string key) in the table. Each non-C<nil> value is used to initialize
the corresponding field.
=item * Uninitialized fields of a C<struct> are filled with zero bytes,
except for the trailing VLA of a VLS.
=item * Initialization of a C<union> stops after one field has been
initialized. If no field has been initialized, the C<union> is filled
with zero bytes.
=item * Elements or fields which are aggregates themselves are
initialized with a I<single> initializer, but this may be a nested
table initializer (or a compatible aggregate).
=item * Excess initializers for an array cause an error. Excess
initializers for a C<struct>/C<union> are ignored. Unrelated table
entries are ignored, too.
=back
Example:
local ffi = require("ffi")
ffi.cdef[[
struct foo { int a, b; };
union bar { int i; double d; };
struct nested { int x; struct foo y; };
]]
ffi.new("int[3]", {}) --> 0, 0, 0
ffi.new("int[3]", {1}) --> 1, 1, 1
ffi.new("int[3]", {1,2}) --> 1, 2, 0
ffi.new("int[3]", {1,2,3}) --> 1, 2, 3
ffi.new("int[3]", {[0]=1}) --> 1, 1, 1
ffi.new("int[3]", {[0]=1,2}) --> 1, 2, 0
ffi.new("int[3]", {[0]=1,2,3}) --> 1, 2, 3
ffi.new("int[3]", {[0]=1,2,3,4}) --> error: too many initializers
ffi.new("struct foo", {}) --> a = 0, b = 0
ffi.new("struct foo", {1}) --> a = 1, b = 0
ffi.new("struct foo", {1,2}) --> a = 1, b = 2
ffi.new("struct foo", {[0]=1,2}) --> a = 1, b = 2
ffi.new("struct foo", {b=2}) --> a = 0, b = 2
ffi.new("struct foo", {a=1,b=2,c=3}) --> a = 1, b = 2 'c' is ignored
ffi.new("union bar", {}) --> i = 0, d = 0.0
ffi.new("union bar", {1}) --> i = 1, d = ?
ffi.new("union bar", {[0]=1,2}) --> i = 1, d = ? '2' is ignored
ffi.new("union bar", {d=2}) --> i = ?, d = 2.0
ffi.new("struct nested", {1,{2,3}}) --> x = 1, y.a = 2, y.b = 3
ffi.new("struct nested", {x=1,y={2,3}}) --> x = 1, y.a = 2, y.b = 3
=head2 Operations on cdata Objects
All of the standard Lua operators can be applied to cdata objects or a
mix of a cdata object and another Lua object. The following list shows
the pre-defined operations.
Reference types are dereferenced I<before> performing each of the
operations below E<mdash> the operation is applied to the C type
pointed to by the reference.
The pre-defined operations are always tried first before deferring to a
metamethod or index table (if any) for the corresponding ctype (except
for C<__new>). An error is raised if the metamethod lookup or index
table lookup fails.
=head2 Indexing a cdata object
=over
=item * B<Indexing a pointer/array>: a cdata pointer/array can be
indexed by a cdata number or a Lua number. The element address is
computed as the base address plus the number value multiplied by the
element size in bytes. A read access loads the element value and
converts it to a Lua object. A write access converts a Lua object to
the element type and stores the converted value to the element. An
error is raised if the element size is undefined or a write access to a
constant element is attempted.
=item * B<Dereferencing a C<struct>/C<union> field>: a cdata
C<struct>/C<union> or a pointer to a C<struct>/C<union> can be
dereferenced by a string key, giving the field name. The field address
is computed as the base address plus the relative offset of the field.
A read access loads the field value and converts it to a Lua object. A
write access converts a Lua object to the field type and stores the
converted value to the field. An error is raised if a write access to a
constant C<struct>/C<union> or a constant field is attempted. Scoped
enum constants or static constants are treated like a constant field.
=item * B<Indexing a complex number>: a complex number can be indexed
either by a cdata number or a Lua number with the values 0 or 1, or by
the strings C<"re"> or C<"im">. A read access loads the real part
(C<[0]>, C<.re>) or the imaginary part (C<[1]>, C<.im>) part of a
complex number and converts it to a Lua number. The sub-parts of a
complex number are immutable E<mdash> assigning to an index of a
complex number raises an error. Accessing out-of-bound indexes returns
unspecified results, but is guaranteed not to trigger memory access
violations.
=item * B<Indexing a vector>: a vector is treated like an array for
indexing purposes, except the vector elements are immutable E<mdash>
assigning to an index of a vector raises an error.
=back
A ctype object can be indexed with a string key, too. The only
pre-defined operation is reading scoped constants of C<struct>/C<union>
types. All other accesses defer to the corresponding metamethods or
index tables (if any).
Note: since there's (deliberately) no address-of operator, a cdata
object holding a value type is effectively immutable after
initialization. The JIT compiler benefits from this fact when applying
certain optimizations.
As a consequence, the I<elements> of complex numbers and vectors are
immutable. But the elements of an aggregate holding these types I<may>
be modified of course. I.e. you cannot assign to C<foo.c.im>, but you
can assign a (newly created) complex number to C<foo.c>.
The JIT compiler implements strict aliasing rules: accesses to
different types do B<not> alias, except for differences in signedness
(this applies even to C<char> pointers, unlike C99). Type punning
through unions is explicitly detected and allowed.
=head2 Calling a cdata object
=over
=item * B<Constructor>: a ctype object can be called and used as a
constructor. This is equivalent to C<ffi.new(ct, ...)>, unless a
C<__new> metamethod is defined. The C<__new> metamethod is called with
the ctype object plus any other arguments passed to the contructor.
Note that you have to use C<ffi.new> inside of it, since calling
C<ct(...)> would cause infinite recursion.
=item * B<C function call>: a cdata function or cdata function pointer
can be called. The passed arguments are converted to the C types of the
parameters given by the function declaration. Arguments passed to the
variable argument part of vararg C function use special conversion
rules. This C function is called and the return value (if any) is
converted to a Lua object.
On Windows/x86 systems, C<__stdcall> functions are automatically
detected and a function declared as C<__cdecl> (the default) is
silently fixed up after the first call.
=back
=head2 Arithmetic on cdata objects
=over
=item * B<Pointer arithmetic>: a cdata pointer/array and a cdata number
or a Lua number can be added or subtracted. The number must be on the
right hand side for a subtraction. The result is a pointer of the same
type with an address plus or minus the number value multiplied by the
element size in bytes. An error is raised if the element size is
undefined.
=item * B<Pointer difference>: two compatible cdata pointers/arrays can
be subtracted. The result is the difference between their addresses,
divided by the element size in bytes. An error is raised if the element
size is undefined or zero.
=item * B<64 bit integer arithmetic>: the standard arithmetic operators
(C<+ - * / % ^> and unary minus) can be applied to two cdata numbers,
or a cdata number and a Lua number. If one of them is an C<uint64_t>,
the other side is converted to an C<uint64_t> and an unsigned
arithmetic operation is performed. Otherwise both sides are converted
to an C<int64_t> and a signed arithmetic operation is performed. The
result is a boxed 64 bit cdata object.
If one of the operands is an C<enum> and the other operand is a string,
the string is converted to the value of a matching C<enum> constant
before the above conversion.
These rules ensure that 64 bit integers are "sticky". Any expression
involving at least one 64 bit integer operand results in another one.
The undefined cases for the division, modulo and power operators return
C<2LL ^ 63> or C<2ULL ^ 63>.
You'll have to explicitly convert a 64 bit integer to a Lua number
(e.g. for regular floating-point calculations) with C<tonumber()>. But
note this may incur a precision loss.
=item * B<64 bit bitwise operations>: the rules for 64 bit arithmetic
operators apply analogously.
Unlike the other C<bit.*> operations, C<bit.tobit()> converts a cdata
number via C<int64_t> to C<int32_t> and returns a Lua number.
For C<bit.band()>, C<bit.bor()> and C<bit.bxor()>, the conversion to
C<int64_t> or C<uint64_t> applies to I<all> arguments, if I<any>
argument is a cdata number.
For all other operations, only the first argument is used to determine
the output type. This implies that a cdata number as a shift count for
shifts and rotates is accepted, but that alone does I<not> cause a
cdata number output.
=back
=head2 Comparisons of cdata objects
=over
=item * B<Pointer comparison>: two compatible cdata pointers/arrays can
be compared. The result is the same as an unsigned comparison of their
addresses. C<nil> is treated like a C<NULL> pointer, which is
compatible with any other pointer type.
=item * B<64 bit integer comparison>: two cdata numbers, or a cdata
number and a Lua number can be compared with each other. If one of them
is an C<uint64_t>, the other side is converted to an C<uint64_t> and an
unsigned comparison is performed. Otherwise both sides are converted to
an C<int64_t> and a signed comparison is performed.
If one of the operands is an C<enum> and the other operand is a string,
the string is converted to the value of a matching C<enum> constant
before the above conversion.
=item * B<Comparisons for equality/inequality> never raise an error.
Even incompatible pointers can be compared for equality by address. Any
other incompatible comparison (also with non-cdata objects) treats the
two sides as unequal.
=back
=head2 cdata objects as table keys
Lua tables may be indexed by cdata objects, but this doesn't provide
any useful semantics E<mdash> B<cdata objects are unsuitable as table
keys!>
A cdata object is treated like any other garbage-collected object and
is hashed and compared by its address for table indexing. Since there's
no interning for cdata value types, the same value may be boxed in
different cdata objects with different addresses. Thus C<t[1LL+1LL]>
and C<t[2LL]> usually B<do not> point to the same hash slot and they
certainly B<do not> point to the same hash slot as C<t[2]>.
It would seriously drive up implementation complexity and slow down the
common case, if one were to add extra handling for by-value hashing and
comparisons to Lua tables. Given the ubiquity of their use inside the
VM, this is not acceptable.
There are three viable alternatives, if you really need to use cdata
objects as keys:
=over
=item * If you can get by with the precision of Lua numbers (52 bits),
then use C<tonumber()> on a cdata number or combine multiple fields of
a cdata aggregate to a Lua number. Then use the resulting Lua number as
a key when indexing tables.
One obvious benefit: C<t[tonumber(2LL)]> B<does> point to the same slot
as C<t[2]>.
=item * Otherwise use either C<tostring()> on 64 bit integers or
complex numbers or combine multiple fields of a cdata aggregate to a
Lua string (e.g. with C<ffi.string()>). Then use the resulting Lua
string as a key when indexing tables.
=item * Create your own specialized hash table implementation using the
C types provided by the FFI library, just like you would in C code.
Ultimately this may give much better performance than the other
alternatives or what a generic by-value hash table could possibly
provide.
=back
=head2 Parameterized Types
To facilitate some abstractions, the two functions C<ffi.typeof> and
C<ffi.cdef> support parameterized types in C declarations. Note: none
of the other API functions taking a cdecl allow this.
Any place you can write a B<C<typedef> name>, an B<identifier> or a
B<number> in a declaration, you can write C<$> (the dollar sign)
instead. These placeholders are replaced in order of appearance with
the arguments following the cdecl string:
-- Declare a struct with a parameterized field type and name:
ffi.cdef([[
typedef struct { $ $; } foo_t;
]], type1, name1)
-- Anonymous struct with dynamic names:
local bar_t = ffi.typeof("struct { int $, $; }", name1, name2)
-- Derived pointer type:
local bar_ptr_t = ffi.typeof("$ *", bar_t)
-- Parameterized dimensions work even where a VLA won't work:
local matrix_t = ffi.typeof("uint8_t[$][$]", width, height)
Caveat: this is I<not> simple text substitution! A passed ctype or
cdata object is treated like the underlying type, a passed string is
considered an identifier and a number is considered a number. You must
not mix this up: e.g. passing C<"int"> as a string doesn't work in
place of a type, you'd need to use C<ffi.typeof("int")> instead.
The main use for parameterized types are libraries implementing
abstract data types (E<rchevron> example), similar to what can be
achieved with C++ template metaprogramming. Another use case are
derived types of anonymous structs, which avoids pollution of the
global struct namespace.
Please note that parameterized types are a nice tool and indispensable
for certain use cases. But you'll want to use them sparingly in regular
code, e.g. when all types are actually fixed.
=head2 Garbage Collection of cdata Objects
All explicitly (C<ffi.new()>, C<ffi.cast()> etc.) or implicitly
(accessors) created cdata objects are garbage collected. You need to
ensure to retain valid references to cdata objects somewhere on a Lua
stack, an upvalue or in a Lua table while they are still in use. Once
the last reference to a cdata object is gone, the garbage collector
will automatically free the memory used by it (at the end of the next
GC cycle).
Please note that pointers themselves are cdata objects, however they
are B<not> followed by the garbage collector. So e.g. if you assign a
cdata array to a pointer, you must keep the cdata object holding the
array alive as long as the pointer is still in use:
ffi.cdef[[
typedef struct { int *a; } foo_t;
]]
local s = ffi.new("foo_t", ffi.new("int[10]")) -- WRONG!
local a = ffi.new("int[10]") -- OK
local s = ffi.new("foo_t", a)
-- Now do something with 's', but keep 'a' alive until you're done.
Similar rules apply for Lua strings which are implicitly converted to
C<"const char *">: the string object itself must be referenced
somewhere or it'll be garbage collected eventually. The pointer will
then point to stale data, which may have already been overwritten. Note
that I<string literals> are automatically kept alive as long as the
function containing it (actually its prototype) is not garbage
collected.
Objects which are passed as an argument to an external C function are
kept alive until the call returns. So it's generally safe to create
temporary cdata objects in argument lists. This is a common idiom for
passing specific C types to vararg functions.
Memory areas returned by C functions (e.g. from C<malloc()>) must be
manually managed, of course (or use C<ffi.gc()>). Pointers to cdata
objects are indistinguishable from pointers returned by C functions
(which is one of the reasons why the GC cannot follow them).
=head2 Callbacks
The LuaJIT FFI automatically generates special callback functions
whenever a Lua function is converted to a C function pointer. This
associates the generated callback function pointer with the C type of
the function pointer and the Lua function object (closure).
This can happen implicitly due to the usual conversions, e.g. when
passing a Lua function to a function pointer argument. Or you can use
C<ffi.cast()> to explicitly cast a Lua function to a C function
pointer.
Currently only certain C function types can be used as callback
functions. Neither C vararg functions nor functions with pass-by-value
aggregate argument or result types are supported. There are no
restrictions for the kind of Lua functions that can be called from the
callback E<mdash> no checks for the proper number of arguments are
made. The return value of the Lua function will be converted to the
result type and an error will be thrown for invalid conversions.
It's allowed to throw errors across a callback invocation, but it's not
advisable in general. Do this only if you know the C function, that
called the callback, copes with the forced stack unwinding and doesn't
leak resources.
One thing that's not allowed, is to let an FFI call into a C function
get JIT-compiled, which in turn calls a callback, calling into Lua
again. Usually this attempt is caught by the interpreter first and the
C function is blacklisted for compilation.
However, this heuristic may fail under specific circumstances: e.g. a
message polling function might not run Lua callbacks right away and the
call gets JIT-compiled. If it later happens to call back into Lua (e.g.
a rarely invoked error callback), you'll get a VM PANIC with the
message C<"bad callback">. Then you'll need to manually turn off
JIT-compilation with C<jit.off()> for the surrounding Lua function that
invokes such a message polling function (or similar).
=head2 Callback resource handling
Callbacks take up resources E<mdash> you can only have a limited number
of them at the same time (500 - 1000, depending on the architecture).
The associated Lua functions are anchored to prevent garbage
collection, too.
B<Callbacks due to implicit conversions are permanent!> There is no way
to guess their lifetime, since the C side might store the function
pointer for later use (typical for GUI toolkits). The associated
resources cannot be reclaimed until termination:
ffi.cdef[[
typedef int (__stdcall *WNDENUMPROC)(void *hwnd, intptr_t l);
int EnumWindows(WNDENUMPROC func, intptr_t l);
]]
-- Implicit conversion to a callback via function pointer argument.
local count = 0
ffi.C.EnumWindows(function(hwnd, l)
count = count + 1
return true
end, 0)
-- The callback is permanent and its resources cannot be reclaimed!
-- Ok, so this may not be a problem, if you do this only once.
Note: this example shows that you I<must> properly declare C<__stdcall>
callbacks on Windows/x86 systems. The calling convention cannot be
automatically detected, unlike for C<__stdcall> calls I<to> Windows
functions.
For some use cases it's necessary to free up the resources or to
dynamically redirect callbacks. Use an explicit cast to a C function
pointer and keep the resulting cdata object. Then use the C<cb:free()>
or C<cb:set()> methods on the cdata object:
-- Explicitly convert to a callback via cast.
local count = 0
local cb = ffi.cast("WNDENUMPROC", function(hwnd, l)
count = count + 1
return true
end)
-- Pass it to a C function.
ffi.C.EnumWindows(cb, 0)
-- EnumWindows doesn't need the callback after it returns, so free it.
cb:free()
-- The callback function pointer is no longer valid and its resources
-- will be reclaimed. The created Lua closure will be garbage collected.
=head2 Callback performance
B<Callbacks are slow!> First, the C to Lua transition itself has an
unavoidable cost, similar to a C<lua_call()> or C<lua_pcall()>.
Argument and result marshalling add to that cost. And finally, neither
the C compiler nor LuaJIT can inline or optimize across the language
barrier and hoist repeated computations out of a callback function.
Do not use callbacks for performance-sensitive work: e.g. consider a
numerical integration routine which takes a user-defined function to
integrate over. It's a bad idea to call a user-defined Lua function
from C code millions of times. The callback overhead will be absolutely
detrimental for performance.
It's considerably faster to write the numerical integration routine
itself in Lua E<mdash> the JIT compiler will be able to inline the
user-defined function and optimize it together with its calling
context, with very competitive performance.
As a general guideline: B<use callbacks only when you must>, because of
existing C APIs. E.g. callback performance is irrelevant for a GUI
application, which waits for user input most of the time, anyway.
For new designs B<avoid push-style APIs>: a C function repeatedly
calling a callback for each result. Instead B<use pull-style APIs>:
call a C function repeatedly to get a new result. Calls from Lua to C
via the FFI are much faster than the other way round. Most
well-designed libraries already use pull-style APIs (read/write,
get/put).
=head2 C Library Namespaces
A C library namespace is a special kind of object which allows access
to the symbols contained in shared libraries or the default symbol
namespace. The default C<ffi.C> namespace is automatically created when
the FFI library is loaded. C library namespaces for specific shared
libraries may be created with the C<ffi.load()> API function.
Indexing a C library namespace object with a symbol name (a Lua string)
automatically binds it to the library. First the symbol type is
resolved E<mdash> it must have been declared with C<ffi.cdef>. Then the
symbol address is resolved by searching for the symbol name in the
associated shared libraries or the default symbol namespace. Finally,
the resulting binding between the symbol name, the symbol type and its
address is cached. Missing symbol declarations or nonexistent symbol
names cause an error.
This is what happens on a B<read access> for the different kinds of
symbols:
=over
=item * External functions: a cdata object with the type of the
function and its address is returned.
=item * External variables: the symbol address is dereferenced and the
loaded value is converted to a Lua object and returned.
=item * Constant values (C<static const> or C<enum> constants): the
constant is converted to a Lua object and returned.
=back
This is what happens on a B<write access>:
=over
=item * External variables: the value to be written is converted to the
C type of the variable and then stored at the symbol address.
=item * Writing to constant variables or to any other symbol type
causes an error, like any other attempted write to a constant location.
=back
C library namespaces themselves are garbage collected objects. If the
last reference to the namespace object is gone, the garbage collector
will eventually release the shared library reference and remove all
memory associated with the namespace. Since this may trigger the
removal of the shared library from the memory of the running process,
it's generally I<not safe> to use function cdata objects obtained from
a library if the namespace object may be unreferenced.
Performance notice: the JIT compiler specializes to the identity of
namespace objects and to the strings used to index it. This effectively
turns function cdata objects into constants. It's not useful and
actually counter-productive to explicitly cache these function objects,
e.g. C<local strlen = ffi.C.strlen>. OTOH it I<is> useful to cache the
namespace itself, e.g. C<local C = ffi.C>.
=head2 No Hand-holding!
The FFI library has been designed as B<a low-level library>. The goal
is to interface with C code and C data types with a minimum of
overhead. This means B<you can do anything you can do from C>: access
all memory, overwrite anything in memory, call machine code at any
memory address and so on.
The FFI library provides B<no memory safety>, unlike regular Lua code.
It will happily allow you to dereference a C<NULL> pointer, to access
arrays out of bounds or to misdeclare C functions. If you make a
mistake, your application might crash, just like equivalent C code
would.
This behavior is inevitable, since the goal is to provide full
interoperability with C code. Adding extra safety measures, like bounds
checks, would be futile. There's no way to detect misdeclarations of C
functions, since shared libraries only provide symbol names, but no
type information. Likewise there's no way to infer the valid range of
indexes for a returned pointer.
Again: the FFI library is a low-level library. This implies it needs to
be used with care, but it's flexibility and performance often outweigh
this concern. If you're a C or C++ developer, it'll be easy to apply
your existing knowledge. OTOH writing code for the FFI library is not
for the faint of heart and probably shouldn't be the first exercise for
someone with little experience in Lua, C or C++.
As a corollary of the above, the FFI library is B<not safe for use by
untrusted Lua code>. If you're sandboxing untrusted Lua code, you
definitely don't want to give this code access to the FFI library or to
I<any> cdata object (except 64 bit integers or complex numbers). Any
properly engineered Lua sandbox needs to provide safety wrappers for
many of the standard Lua library functions E<mdash> similar wrappers
need to be written for high-level operations on FFI data types, too.
=head2 Current Status
The initial release of the FFI library has some limitations and is
missing some features. Most of these will be fixed in future releases.
C language support is currently incomplete:
=over
=item * C declarations are not passed through a C pre-processor, yet.
=item * The C parser is able to evaluate most constant expressions
commonly found in C header files. However it doesn't handle the full
range of C expression semantics and may fail for some obscure
constructs.
=item * C<static const> declarations only work for integer types up to
32 bits. Neither declaring string constants nor floating-point
constants is supported.
=item * Packed C<struct> bitfields that cross container boundaries are
not implemented.
=item * Native vector types may be defined with the GCC C<mode> or
C<vector_size> attribute. But no operations other than loading, storing
and initializing them are supported, yet.
=item * The C<volatile> type qualifier is currently ignored by compiled
code.
=item * C<ffi.cdef> silently ignores most re-declarations. Note: avoid
re-declarations which do not conform to C99. The implementation will
eventually be changed to perform strict checks.
=back
The JIT compiler already handles a large subset of all FFI operations.
It automatically falls back to the interpreter for unimplemented
operations (you can check for this with the C<-jv> command line
option). The following operations are currently not compiled and may
exhibit suboptimal performance, especially when used in inner loops:
=over
=item * Vector operations.
=item * Table initializers.
=item * Initialization of nested C<struct>/C<union> types.
=item * Non-default initialization of VLA/VLS or large C types (E<gt>
128 bytes or E<gt> 16 array elements.
=item * Bitfield initializations.
=item * Pointer differences for element sizes that are not a power of
two.
=item * Calls to C functions with aggregates passed or returned by
value.
=item * Calls to ctype metamethods which are not plain functions.
=item * ctype C<__newindex> tables and non-string lookups in ctype
C<__index> tables.
=item * C<tostring()> for cdata types.
=item * Calls to C<ffi.cdef()>, C<ffi.load()> and C<ffi.metatype()>.
=back
Other missing features:
=over
=item * Arithmetic for C<complex> numbers.
=item * Passing structs by value to vararg C functions.
=item * C++ exception interoperability does not extend to C functions
called via the FFI, if the call is compiled.
=back
----
Copyright E<copy> 2005-2017 Mike Pall E<middot> Contact
=cut
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