1 files changed, 74 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/include/git2/buffer.h b/include/git2/buffer.h
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9fa9720
--- /dev/null
+++ b/include/git2/buffer.h
@@ -0,0 +1,74 @@
+/*
+ * Copyright (C) the libgit2 contributors. All rights reserved.
+ *
+ * This file is part of libgit2, distributed under the GNU GPL v2 with
+ * a Linking Exception. For full terms see the included COPYING file.
+ */
+#ifndef INCLUDE_git_buf_h__
+#define INCLUDE_git_buf_h__
+
+#include "common.h"
+
+/**
+ * @file git2/buffer.h
+ * @brief Buffer export structure
+ *
+ * @ingroup Git
+ * @{
+ */
+GIT_BEGIN_DECL
+
+/**
+ * A data buffer for exporting data from libgit2
+ *
+ * Sometimes libgit2 wants to return an allocated data buffer to the
+ * caller and have the caller take responsibility for freeing that memory.
+ * To make ownership clear in these cases, libgit2 uses  `git_buf` to
+ * return this data.  Callers should use `git_buf_dispose()` to release
+ * the memory when they are done.
+ *
+ * A `git_buf` contains a pointer to a NUL-terminated C string, and
+ * the length of the string (not including the NUL terminator).
+ */
+typedef struct {
+	/**
+	 * The buffer contents.  `ptr` points to the start of the buffer
+	 * being returned.  The buffer's length (in bytes) is specified
+	 * by the `size` member of the structure, and contains a NUL
+	 * terminator at position `(size + 1)`.
+	 */
+	char *ptr;
+
+	/**
+	 * This field is reserved and unused.
+	 */
+	size_t reserved;
+
+	/**
+	 * The length (in bytes) of the buffer pointed to by `ptr`,
+	 * not including a NUL terminator.
+	 */
+	size_t size;
+} git_buf;
+
+/**
+ * Use to initialize a `git_buf` before passing it to a function that
+ * will populate it.
+ */
+#define GIT_BUF_INIT { NULL, 0, 0 }
+
+/**
+ * Free the memory referred to by the git_buf.
+ *
+ * Note that this does not free the `git_buf` itself, just the memory
+ * pointed to by `buffer->ptr`.
+ *
+ * @param buffer The buffer to deallocate
+ */
+GIT_EXTERN(void) git_buf_dispose(git_buf *buffer);
+
+GIT_END_DECL
+
+/** @} */
+
+#endif