[swift-users] What is "binding" memory?

[Manfred Schubert]

The "UnsafeRawPointer Migration" guide talks about "binding memory to a type“ as if that was a well known term. I have never heard of it yet though, and googling it returns no relevant results. I do not understand what binding memory is supposed to do.

The migration guide says "Binding uninitialized memory to a type prepares the memory to store values of that type“, but clearly raw memory does not need to be prepared (and cannot be) to hold any arbitrary type and value.

So what is this for, what does it actually do, and to whom is it done (the raw pointer, or the typed pointer which is returned, or the raw memory)?


Manfred