Is there already a vanara helper to work with pointers to strings safely?

[catmanjan]

I find myself doing this sort of thing often:

            var fileIdentity = Marshal.PtrToStringAuto(CallbackInfo.FileIdentity);
            Marshal.FreeCoTaskMem(CallbackInfo.FileIdentity);

Is there a nice neat Vanara object to handle this for me?

[dahall]

Yes. SafeLP?Str in Vanara.Core is an IDisposable SafeHandle that holds strings in native memory.

SafeLPWStr str1 = new(256); // Wide string with capacity of 256 chars.
SafeLPTStr str2 = new("Some random string"); // Auto string with string copied to its memory
SafeLPStr str3 = new((StrPtrAnsi)ptr, true, 128); // Capture an existing IntPtr and manage its disposal and length of 128

string? s = str1;

[catmanjan]

Thanks @dahall , if I don't provide a length does it behave like auto and look for a terminator?

[dahall]

Yes, though methods that rely on Length, won't work or will have unpredictable results.