[Python-Dev] Buffer protocol for io.BytesIO? (original) (raw)

Stefan Behnel stefan_ml at behnel.de
Fri Sep 3 10:04:12 CEST 2010

Antoine Pitrou, 02.09.2010 22:35:

In issue #5506, I originally proposed that io.BytesIO objects support the buffer protocol, to make it possible to access the internal buffer without intermediate copies.

Then it came to me then perhaps it would be too automatic. So I'm currently floating between: - add implicit buffer protocol support to BytesIO objects

Hmm, given that you actually have to explicitly call the getbuffer operation on the BytesIO object, I don't have the impression that this would be implicit support.

What would be the advantage of having to do two operations? Is it just that you want to make the internal buffer joining step more visible? (thinking in terms of good-old Py2 StringIO here, not sure how io.BytesIO works these days)

Also, note that the BytesIO object must not be modified while someone reads the buffer. That would be a less obvious side effect if the returned buffer object was different from the BytesIO object itself.

Stefan

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