struct to byte[]

[Luís Marques]

Derek Parnell wrote:
> Yes, but unfortunately the actual function is faulty. Here is what I had to
> do to get it to work ...
> 
> ubyte [] toByteArray (T) (inout T t)
> {
>     union ubyte_abi
>     {
>         ubyte[] x;
>         struct
>         {
>            uint  xl; // length
>            void* xp; // ptr
>         }
>     }
>     ubyte_abi res;
>     res.xp = cast(void*)&t;
>     res.xl = T.sizeof;
>     return res.x;
> }
> 
> unittest
> {
>    struct Foo_uni
>    {
>       int a;
>       real b;
>       char[4] c;
>       dchar[] d;
>    }
>    Foo_uni f;
>    ubyte[] b;
> 
>    b = toByteArray(f);
> 
>    assert(b.length == f.sizeof);
>    assert(cast(void*)(b.ptr) == cast(void *)&f);
> 
>    real c;
>    b = toByteArray(c);
>    assert(b.length == c.sizeof);
>    assert(cast(void*)(b.ptr) == cast(void *)&c);
> 
>    class Bar_uni
>    {
>       int a;
>       real b;
>       char[4] c;
>       dchar[] d;
>    }
>    Bar_uni g = new Bar_uni;
> 
>    b = toByteArray(g.d);
>    assert(b.length == g.d.sizeof);
>    assert(cast(void*)(b.ptr) == cast(void *)&g.d);
> 
> }

Amazing. Thanks.

Yet, by this time, don't you think it would be best if the compiler 
worked out the cast to ubyte[] on its own?