debian man page for memswap

MEMSWAP(3pub)						       C Programmer's Manual						     MEMSWAP(3pub)

NAME
       memswap - swap the contents of two memory blocks

SYNOPSIS
       #include <publib.h>
       void memswap(void *block1, void *block2, size_t n);

DESCRIPTION
       memswap	will  swap  the  contents  of  the  two blocks pointed by its first two arguments.  The last argument gives the size of the memory
       blocks.

EXAMPLE
       To swap two structs, one might do the following.

	    struct tm tm1, tm2;

	    memswap(&tm1, &tm2, sizeof(struct tm));

BUGS
       Using memswap to swap small portions of memory is inefficient.  It is not worth it to use it to swap variables of any of the  basic  types,
       for instance.  Use inline code for such cases.  However, for large portions of memory, e.g., arrays, it is convenient.

       memswap	can't  swap variables whose address can't be taken.  This excludes variables with the register specifier and bitfields in structs.
       But then, there is no way to write a function (or macro) that can handle any kind of arguments.	Life is hard.

SEE ALSO
       publib(3)

AUTHOR
       Lars Wirzenius (lars.wirzenius@helsinki.fi)

Publib							       C Programmer's Manual						     MEMSWAP(3pub)