[DRMAA-WG] DRMAAv2 C binding - Final Draft: Should interface type names get a special ending?

[Klauck, Stefan]

Dear all,

there is another issue I would like to discuss.



(Regarding memory management) There are two kind of functions:

- One the one hand, some functions return drmaa structures with according drmaa2_*_free functions for the returned pointer. The application has to manage/free these structures.
Examples:
drmaa2_jinfo       drmaa2_j_get_info          (const drmaa2_j j);
drmaa2_jtemplate   drmaa2_j_get_jt            (const drmaa2_j j);


- One the other hand, there are functions returning drmaa interface types (JobSession, ReservationSession, MonitoringSession, Job, JobArray and Reservation).
Examples:
drmaa2_jsession     drmaa2_create_jsession              (const char * session_name, const char * contact);
drmaa2_j           drmaa2_j_wait_terminated   (const drmaa2_j j, const time_t timeout);

The interface types have according typedef declarations in the header file:

typedef struct drmaa2_jsession_s * drmaa2_jsession;
typedef struct drmaa2_rsession_s * drmaa2_rsession;
typedef struct drmaa2_msession_s * drmaa2_msession;
typedef struct drmaa2_j_s * drmaa2_j;
typedef struct drmaa2_jarray_s * drmaa2_jarray;
typedef struct drmaa2_r_s * drmaa2_r;

The according structures are managed by drmaa implementations.

The issue to discuss:
Should interface type names therefore get a special ending like '_h' (standing for handle)?

Example
typedef struct drmaa2_jsession_s * drmaa2_jsession_h;

-> Application:
drmaa2_jsession_h js = drmaa2_create_jsession("my_session", NULL);
// "I see that it's an handle and thus I do not need to free it"


Best regards
Stefan Klauck