What is the difference between .l and .LONG?

[Quin]

In a lot of PB codes, I see stuff like:

Code: Select all

*Len.LONG

or

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*input.ASCII

My question is, where are all these possible types listed, and more importantly what do they do? Since I typically see them used with pointers I assume this is a way of storing pointers to native types, but I can't find any mention of it in the documentation.
The pointers chapter shows the .String type, but no others.
Thanks, and sorry if it's obvious...

[AZJIO]

Open structure view in tools
Tools -> Structure Viewer

[Quin]

Open structure view in tools
Tools -> Structure Viewer

Cool, but I asked what it does, not what fields it contains

[HeX0R]

.LONG is a structure, whereas .l is a variable type.
It is typically used, when you are sending variables ByRef to a procedure to make your life easier.
Quick example:

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Procedure ChangeByRef(*Value)
	Protected Value = PeekI(*Value)
	
	Value = Value + 2
	PokeI(*Value, Value)
EndProcedure

Procedure ChangeByRef2(*Value.INTEGER)
	*Value\i + 2
EndProcedure


A = 100
ChangeByRef(@A)
Debug A
A = 100
ChangeByRef2(@A)
Debug A

[AZJIO]

What does the structure do? She doesn't do anything. This is simply a place where data is placed. With a struct, instead of passing a number to a function, you pass a pointer to that number. The number is not copied. If you use pointer access, it is as if you were accessing a global variable.
LONG is simply the name of a structure that creates a field of the same type. You can create the same structure with a different name.

example

[idle]

also see pointers and memory access
https://www.purebasic.com/documentation ... emory.html

The defined PB structures, look at the basic types table
https://www.purebasic.com/documentation ... ables.html
those are the structure names

there are of course loads of OS specific structures. under tools ALT+S

[Quin]

.LONG is a structure, whereas .l is a variable type.
It is typically used, when you are sending variables ByRef to a procedure to make your life easier.

Ah, I see! Thanks!