The ctypes module

  ctypes home :: "tutorial":ctypes/tutorial.html ::
  "reference":ctypes/reference.html :: "faq":ctypes/faq.html

  Overview

    'ctypes' is a Python module allowing to create and manipulate C
    data types in Python. These can then be passed to C-functions
    loaded from dynamic link libraries.

  Status

    The first public versions of 'ctypes' were marked *experimental*.
    I'm currently rewriting the internals to do better checking, and
    implementing unittests for it. It is amazing how many bugs these
    tests find, although using 'ctypes' has been quite successful. The
    tests seem to improve the code quality a lot.

  Testimonials

    *I am using it and much prefer it to the calldll/windll
    ... easy to use, well documented ...*  - Ben C

    *Your ctypes stuff is awesome! Thanks so much for making
    it. Almost every time I write a C extension it's so I can call
    some Windows function - I don't know if I'll need to do that much
    anymore and that makes me very happy. :)* - Dave Brueck

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    *ctypes! With stuff like Pysco and Pyrex maturing, the main reason
    I was still writing C extensions was to access various Windows
    APIs (especially those not covered in the Win32 Python
    extensions), but no longer - I may never write another "wrapper"
    extension again and that makes me very, very happy. :)* - Dave
    Brueck

    *I like the idea of using ctypes for creating highly native
    windows applications. So far I have been using wxPython, but that
    library is so big that it adds 3-4 seconds latency to the startup
    of the python :-), Also memory footprint is kind of huge.* - Henk Punt

    *... and I just started using ctypes tonight. Good old
    calldll/windll won't be in my toolkit much longer. :) It's a very
    exciting time for Python. Between Psyco and ctypes, writing code
    in C is becoming quite rare for me!* - Jimmy Retzlaff

    *ctypes is very cool! Great piece of work.* - Just van Rossum

  News

    **'ctypes' now works on Windows, Linux and MacOSX**. Thanks
    to *Robin Becker* and *Just van Rossum* for their help.

    There is now a mailing list which should be used to discuss the
    usage and further development of 'ctypes'.  More info can be found
    on the "list info page":http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ctypes-users.

    'ctypes' Development now takes place on sourceforge's "ctypes
    project page":http://sourceforge.net/projects/ctypes.

    I've started a "FAQ":ctypes/faq.html which should be consulted
    in case of problems.

  Documentation

    An extensive tutorial, which is unfortunately a bit out of date,
    is included in the source distribution, but also available
    "online":ctypes/tutorial.html.  It will be corrected and rewritten
    in a future release.  You should also read the sample files in the
    source distribution.


  Downloads

    Recent releases can be downloaded in the "sourceforge files
    section":http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=71702.

    The source archives contain all the sources, the documentation you
    are reading here, and sample files in a 'samples' subdirectory.
    Looking at the sample files is highly recommended in addition to
    reading the documentation.

    The binary Windows distribution only contains the 'ctypes' module
    as well as the underlying '_ctypes' extension module.

    These files are distibuted under the "MIT license":LICENSE.txt.


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