This is a similar question to this SO post, which I have been unable to use to solve my problem. I have included some code here, which will hopefully help someone to bring home the message that the other posting was getting at.
I want to write a CLI/C++ method that can take a void pointer as a parameter and return the managed object (whose type I know) that it points to. I have a managed struct:
public ref struct ManagedStruct { double a; double b;};
The method I am trying to write, which takes a void pointer to the managed struct as a parameter and returns the struct.
ManagedStruct^ VoidPointerToObject(void* data)
{
Object^ result = Marshal::PtrToStructure(IntPtr(data), Object::typeid);
return (ManagedStruct^)result;
}
The method is called here:
int main(array<System::String ^> ^args)
{
// The instance of the managed type is created:
ManagedStruct^ myData = gcnew ManagedStruct();
myData->a = 1; myData->b = 2;
// Suppose there was a void pointer that pointed to this managed struct
void* voidPtr = &myData;
//A method to return the original struct from the void pointer
Object^ result = VoidPointerToObject(voidPtr);
return 0;
}
It crashes in the VoidPointerToObject
method on calling PtrToStructure
, with the error: The specified structure must be blittable or have layout information
I know this is an odd thing to do, but it is a situation I have encountered a few times, especially when unmanaged code makes a callback to managed code and passes a void* as a parameter.