It is possible to get a pointer from a managed array
byte [] buffer = new byte[length + byteAlignment];
GCHandle bufferHandle = GCHandle.Alloc(buffer, GCHandleType.Pinned);
IntPtr ptr = bufferHandle.AddrOfPinnedObject();
is there any way to do the opposite. getting a byte array from a pinned object without copying?
Sure, that's what Marshal.Copy
is for - there is no way (well, no way without copying of some variety) to otherwise get memory between the managed and unmanaged states...well, that's not 100% true, but I'm assuming you don't want to rely solely on Win32/C and p/invoke to copy memory around.
Marshal.Copy
use would look like:
IntPtr addressOfThing = ....;
byte[] buffer = new byte[...];
Marshal.Copy(addressOfThing, buffer, 0, bufferSize);