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  3. I thought .NET was supposed to make things easier, if anything, than unmanaged code.

I thought .NET was supposed to make things easier, if anything, than unmanaged code.

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  • H honey the codewitch

    unsafe isn't a problem. This has nothing to do with a desire not to run unsafe code Again, what it has to do with is mapping a complex managed data structure to a file using Vmem. It's not doable. At best, you resolve to something much like standard file i/o which defeats the whole reason i'd use vmem. Adding, span would help here, but it doesn't go near enough to to be a solution since these data structures aren't simple arrays.

    When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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    zezba9000
    wrote on last edited by
    #79

    Then just wrap the C API that does what you want. Anything you can do in C you can do in C# by using it like C. So it is doable just maybe not how you like.

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    • Z zezba9000

      Then just wrap the C API that does what you want. Anything you can do in C you can do in C# by using it like C. So it is doable just maybe not how you like.

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      honey the codewitch
      wrote on last edited by
      #80

      can't do that either because it ties it to a platform. the goal is cross platform. At best i'd have to do two binaries per platform. and it would only support a limited number of them. So it doesn't fulfill the requirements. If I didn't care about being cross platform, I'd just use mixed mode C++. It's okay that this isn't doable. I accept it. It would just be nice if it was.

      When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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      • D Dewey

        That Ezra Taft Benson, while true, is one of the dumbest remarks I've seen, and is used by some groups to put down government. The point of government is to take your money and do what's best for the people as a whole. You can argue that isn't what happens in some cases, but that misses the point. Government generally is the only entity that takes risks when the reward isn't obvious. That where just about all of our technology comes from because industry won't invest without the promise of fairly quick rewards.

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        Steven1218
        wrote on last edited by
        #81

        I have seen a similar quote attributed to Thomas Jefferson. I think it is less about government per se, but more about the scale of government.

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        • H honey the codewitch

          can't do that either because it ties it to a platform. the goal is cross platform. At best i'd have to do two binaries per platform. and it would only support a limited number of them. So it doesn't fulfill the requirements. If I didn't care about being cross platform, I'd just use mixed mode C++. It's okay that this isn't doable. I accept it. It would just be nice if it was.

          When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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          zezba9000
          wrote on last edited by
          #82

          You don't need multiple native or managed binaries for this. You can just wrap each platform and detect what platform you're on in the .NET runtime via RuntimeInformation class. So you would probably only need one for Win32 and one for POSIX (aka Linux, BSD and macOS). Because a .NET lib doesn't exist for what you need thats portable, you will have to make one that is.

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          • Z zezba9000

            You don't need multiple native or managed binaries for this. You can just wrap each platform and detect what platform you're on in the .NET runtime via RuntimeInformation class. So you would probably only need one for Win32 and one for POSIX (aka Linux, BSD and macOS). Because a .NET lib doesn't exist for what you need thats portable, you will have to make one that is.

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            honey the codewitch
            wrote on last edited by
            #83

            Once again, I cannot map objects to a specific process address space in .NET. No amount of marshalling or unsafe code will change that. It might be possible to create an unmanaged cross compiled library and link to the different calling conventions etc, by conditional P/Invoke, at the cost of extra complexity and adds marshalling to a class that shouldn't have it for perf reasons, and still requiring a cross compiled unmanaged binary and still therefore being limited to certain platforms, not all .NET platforms. So again, it doesn't fulfill the basic requirement because of that latter bit. I accept that it can't be done in .NET

            When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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            • H honey the codewitch

              Once again, I cannot map objects to a specific process address space in .NET. No amount of marshalling or unsafe code will change that. It might be possible to create an unmanaged cross compiled library and link to the different calling conventions etc, by conditional P/Invoke, at the cost of extra complexity and adds marshalling to a class that shouldn't have it for perf reasons, and still requiring a cross compiled unmanaged binary and still therefore being limited to certain platforms, not all .NET platforms. So again, it doesn't fulfill the basic requirement because of that latter bit. I accept that it can't be done in .NET

              When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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              zezba9000
              wrote on last edited by
              #84

              You said using unsafe code wasn't an issue? So again anything you can do in C can be done in C# if you use unsafe code if thats not an issue to you. It sounds like you don't fully understand what you can do in unsafe code in C#. Cross compiling a native binary would be the same as just using unsafe code in C# and wraping the C methods you need.

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              • Z zezba9000

                You said using unsafe code wasn't an issue? So again anything you can do in C can be done in C# if you use unsafe code if thats not an issue to you. It sounds like you don't fully understand what you can do in unsafe code in C#. Cross compiling a native binary would be the same as just using unsafe code in C# and wraping the C methods you need.

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                honey the codewitch
                wrote on last edited by
                #85

                zezba9000 wrote:

                So again anything you can do in C can be done in C# if you use unsafe code

                This is categorically incorrect. There is no way to map a .NET object to a file backed portion of the process address space and there likely never will be in .NET. Copying the object to that space or otherwise serializing it is not the same thing at all. I'm going attempt to summarize: You cannot create an object at a specific memory location in managed code.

                When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                • H honey the codewitch

                  zezba9000 wrote:

                  So again anything you can do in C can be done in C# if you use unsafe code

                  This is categorically incorrect. There is no way to map a .NET object to a file backed portion of the process address space and there likely never will be in .NET. Copying the object to that space or otherwise serializing it is not the same thing at all. I'm going attempt to summarize: You cannot create an object at a specific memory location in managed code.

                  When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                  zezba9000
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #86

                  You don't need to if you use pointers in C# just like you would in C. AKA "unsafe code". Unsafe code doesn't require the use of managed objects. Use int* instead of int[] then it will work. More info: Unsafe code and pointers - C# Programming Guide | Microsoft Docs[^]

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                  • Z zezba9000

                    You don't need to if you use pointers in C# just like you would in C. AKA "unsafe code". Unsafe code doesn't require the use of managed objects. Use int* instead of int[] then it will work. More info: Unsafe code and pointers - C# Programming Guide | Microsoft Docs[^]

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                    honey the codewitch
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #87

                    I'm sorry but yes you do if you want that region to be backed by a memory mapped file. otherwise you're just copying/serializing objects into that space at best. to back an object with a memory mapped region of the process address space you'd have to be able to pin an object to a specific address - not really possible in a garbage collected system without some sort of significant work around.

                    When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                    • H honey the codewitch

                      I'm sorry but yes you do if you want that region to be backed by a memory mapped file. otherwise you're just copying/serializing objects into that space at best. to back an object with a memory mapped region of the process address space you'd have to be able to pin an object to a specific address - not really possible in a garbage collected system without some sort of significant work around.

                      When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                      zezba9000
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #88

                      No you don't have to copy memory if you use a native pointer to a memory mapped file. In C# a pointer like "int*" is the same as a pointer in C/C++. There is no difference. That pointer in C# will directly be pointing to your native memory buffer you allocated from a native Win32 or POSIX API. Pointers in C# can point to literally anything just as they can in C/C++. That includes managed and unmanaged memory locations. For example this psuedo C# code would work:

                      [DllImport("nativeLib")]
                      static unsafe extern int* CreateNativeMemoryMappedFile();

                      unsafe void WriteMemoryMappedFile()
                      {
                      int* nativeMemory = CreateNativeMemoryMappedFile();
                      nativeMemory[0] = 123;// this is writing directly from the native buffer (not a copy)
                      if (nativeMemory[1] == 321) return;// this is reading directly from the native buffer (not a copy)
                      }

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                      • Z zezba9000

                        No you don't have to copy memory if you use a native pointer to a memory mapped file. In C# a pointer like "int*" is the same as a pointer in C/C++. There is no difference. That pointer in C# will directly be pointing to your native memory buffer you allocated from a native Win32 or POSIX API. Pointers in C# can point to literally anything just as they can in C/C++. That includes managed and unmanaged memory locations. For example this psuedo C# code would work:

                        [DllImport("nativeLib")]
                        static unsafe extern int* CreateNativeMemoryMappedFile();

                        unsafe void WriteMemoryMappedFile()
                        {
                        int* nativeMemory = CreateNativeMemoryMappedFile();
                        nativeMemory[0] = 123;// this is writing directly from the native buffer (not a copy)
                        if (nativeMemory[1] == 321) return;// this is reading directly from the native buffer (not a copy)
                        }

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                        honey the codewitch
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #89

                        you cannot create objects at that pointer. ergo, no vmem backed objects. you can do pointer ops, but then you're copying object data from the object (on GC heap) to the unmanaged heap. If I do a memcpy, or pointer based assignment in a for loop, either way i'm copying the data. and doing so, even if i did, is really no different than calling (filestream).Write(...) which would be more direct. there is no way around it because of how a GC works. if you think I'm wrong show me how to *create an object* at a specific address in .NET - because that's the only way to back an object with vmem, short of creating a custom CLI host in C(++) or some other unmanaged language and AFAICT would have to back an entire appdomain with vmem for it to work.

                        When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                        • H honey the codewitch

                          you cannot create objects at that pointer. ergo, no vmem backed objects. you can do pointer ops, but then you're copying object data from the object (on GC heap) to the unmanaged heap. If I do a memcpy, or pointer based assignment in a for loop, either way i'm copying the data. and doing so, even if i did, is really no different than calling (filestream).Write(...) which would be more direct. there is no way around it because of how a GC works. if you think I'm wrong show me how to *create an object* at a specific address in .NET - because that's the only way to back an object with vmem, short of creating a custom CLI host in C(++) or some other unmanaged language and AFAICT would have to back an entire appdomain with vmem for it to work.

                          When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                          zezba9000
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #90

                          "

                          Quote:

                          if you think I'm wrong show me how to *create an object* at a specific address in .NET

                          Invoke the C method from C# you would use to allocation memory at that specific vmem address. Keep a reference to that address in C# as a pointer as you would in C. No difference from doing it in C. Again if you can address it in C you can address it in C# using pointers. Can you show me what method you're invoking in C that allocates memory at a specific address? Then I can give an example and it would remove the confusion. I can only guess at what methods you're trying to use.

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                          • Z zezba9000

                            "

                            Quote:

                            if you think I'm wrong show me how to *create an object* at a specific address in .NET

                            Invoke the C method from C# you would use to allocation memory at that specific vmem address. Keep a reference to that address in C# as a pointer as you would in C. No difference from doing it in C. Again if you can address it in C you can address it in C# using pointers. Can you show me what method you're invoking in C that allocates memory at a specific address? Then I can give an example and it would remove the confusion. I can only guess at what methods you're trying to use.

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                            honey the codewitch
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #91

                            what C method? the method to create the object? that's not a .NET object. I can already do all this mapping in C. There's no point in any of that.

                            When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                            • Z zezba9000

                              "

                              Quote:

                              if you think I'm wrong show me how to *create an object* at a specific address in .NET

                              Invoke the C method from C# you would use to allocation memory at that specific vmem address. Keep a reference to that address in C# as a pointer as you would in C. No difference from doing it in C. Again if you can address it in C you can address it in C# using pointers. Can you show me what method you're invoking in C that allocates memory at a specific address? Then I can give an example and it would remove the confusion. I can only guess at what methods you're trying to use.

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                              honey the codewitch
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #92

                              you do understand that paged memory allows you to do pointer ops directly to a file, i assume? and that normally what you'd do is just create your data structures at that memory mapped address and then use them like normal classes and structure, which are automatically written to disk as they are accessed.

                              struct foo {
                              int bar;
                              };

                              foo* pfoo = VirtualAlloc(..., sizeof(foo));
                              pfoo->bar=1; // writes to disk
                              printf("%d",pfoo->bar); // reads from disk.

                              there is simply no way to do that in .NET if you're saying there is show me how. Your method call technique does not enable this.

                              When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                              • H honey the codewitch

                                you do understand that paged memory allows you to do pointer ops directly to a file, i assume? and that normally what you'd do is just create your data structures at that memory mapped address and then use them like normal classes and structure, which are automatically written to disk as they are accessed.

                                struct foo {
                                int bar;
                                };

                                foo* pfoo = VirtualAlloc(..., sizeof(foo));
                                pfoo->bar=1; // writes to disk
                                printf("%d",pfoo->bar); // reads from disk.

                                there is simply no way to do that in .NET if you're saying there is show me how. Your method call technique does not enable this.

                                When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                                zezba9000
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #93

                                lol yes there is. You didn't read anything I said. As I said before. C# pointers are the same as C/C++. Look at the example below. I literally just compiled and ran this on my computer with zero errors.

                                using System;
                                using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

                                using SIZE_T = System.IntPtr;
                                using DWORD = System.UInt32;

                                namespace TestNet
                                {
                                [StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential)]
                                struct Foo
                                {
                                public int bar;
                                }

                                static class Program
                                {
                                	\[DllImport("Kernel32.dll")\]
                                	private static unsafe extern void\* VirtualAlloc(void\* lpAddress, SIZE\_T dwSize, DWORD flAllocationType, DWORD flProtect);
                                
                                	private const DWORD MEM\_COMMIT = 0x00001000;
                                	private const DWORD PAGE\_READWRITE = 0x04;
                                
                                	static unsafe void Main(string\[\] args)
                                	{
                                		Foo\* pfoo = (Foo\*)VirtualAlloc((void\*)0, (SIZE\_T)sizeof(Foo), MEM\_COMMIT, PAGE\_READWRITE);
                                		pfoo->bar = 1; // writes to disk
                                		Console.WriteLine(pfoo->bar.ToString()); // reads from disk.
                                	}
                                }
                                

                                }

                                Make a C# console app and paste that code in. WaLa!!

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                                • Z zezba9000

                                  lol yes there is. You didn't read anything I said. As I said before. C# pointers are the same as C/C++. Look at the example below. I literally just compiled and ran this on my computer with zero errors.

                                  using System;
                                  using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

                                  using SIZE_T = System.IntPtr;
                                  using DWORD = System.UInt32;

                                  namespace TestNet
                                  {
                                  [StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential)]
                                  struct Foo
                                  {
                                  public int bar;
                                  }

                                  static class Program
                                  {
                                  	\[DllImport("Kernel32.dll")\]
                                  	private static unsafe extern void\* VirtualAlloc(void\* lpAddress, SIZE\_T dwSize, DWORD flAllocationType, DWORD flProtect);
                                  
                                  	private const DWORD MEM\_COMMIT = 0x00001000;
                                  	private const DWORD PAGE\_READWRITE = 0x04;
                                  
                                  	static unsafe void Main(string\[\] args)
                                  	{
                                  		Foo\* pfoo = (Foo\*)VirtualAlloc((void\*)0, (SIZE\_T)sizeof(Foo), MEM\_COMMIT, PAGE\_READWRITE);
                                  		pfoo->bar = 1; // writes to disk
                                  		Console.WriteLine(pfoo->bar.ToString()); // reads from disk.
                                  	}
                                  }
                                  

                                  }

                                  Make a C# console app and paste that code in. WaLa!!

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                                  honey the codewitch
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #94

                                  i'm going to try that. Assuming it works, I apologize for all the churn. You may have just taught my stubborn self something. the example really helped, so thank you.

                                  When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                                  • H honey the codewitch

                                    i'm going to try that. Assuming it works, I apologize for all the churn. You may have just taught my stubborn self something. the example really helped, so thank you.

                                    When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                                    zezba9000
                                    wrote on last edited by
                                    #95

                                    np ;)

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                                    • H honey the codewitch

                                      it's mixed mode, as I understand it. Managed *and* unmanaged in the same PE. So it's not simply a .NET assembly but an assembly with a bag on the side of unmanaged code. I'm certain this was true when it was introduced. It probably still is. also i think there's still marshalling going on with managed->unmanaged calls in C++/CLI it might be more efficient than the standard marshalling though, but it's still marshalling.

                                      When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

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                                      TheGreatAndPowerfulOz
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #96

                                      See here[^]

                                      #SupportHeForShe Government can give you nothing but what it takes from somebody else. A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take everything you've got, including your freedom.-Ezra Taft Benson You must accept 1 of 2 basic premises: Either we are alone in the universe or we are not alone. Either way, the implications are staggering!-Wernher von Braun

                                      H 1 Reply Last reply
                                      0
                                      • T TheGreatAndPowerfulOz

                                        See here[^]

                                        #SupportHeForShe Government can give you nothing but what it takes from somebody else. A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take everything you've got, including your freedom.-Ezra Taft Benson You must accept 1 of 2 basic premises: Either we are alone in the universe or we are not alone. Either way, the implications are staggering!-Wernher von Braun

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                                        honey the codewitch
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #97

                                        yeah thanks. Though what zebra006 (sp?) showed me was more what I was after. Either way, it gives me a starting point.

                                        When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.

                                        T 1 Reply Last reply
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                                        • R Rajesh R Subramanian

                                          honey the codewitch wrote:

                                          Nobody made you respond to me.

                                          If you're a nobody, then yes.

                                          honey the codewitch wrote:

                                          Now I'm blocking you so I don't have to listen to this anymore.

                                          TMI - I don't need to know what you are doing on the internet.

                                          T Offline
                                          T Offline
                                          TheGreatAndPowerfulOz
                                          wrote on last edited by
                                          #98

                                          No reason to be an asshole.

                                          #SupportHeForShe Government can give you nothing but what it takes from somebody else. A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take everything you've got, including your freedom.-Ezra Taft Benson You must accept 1 of 2 basic premises: Either we are alone in the universe or we are not alone. Either way, the implications are staggering!-Wernher von Braun

                                          R 1 Reply Last reply
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