Larry,

I see the distinction. I'm just curious what happens under the hood between C# and the CLR if the entire C# program is unsafe.

>>Hey Mike,
>>
>>hmmm...that's very interesting. Thanks for the link.
>>
>>For some reason I thought it was an all or nothing proposition, at least w/C++. At least Larry Miller said something to that effect recently (you were involved in the thread at one point).
>>
>>>>I don't think C# can run unmanaged code...C++ has the ability to do managed or unmanaged. I'll try to look into it tomorrow.
>>>
>>>I've never done it, but it looks possible. message#613147
>
>Steve,
>I don't think it's quite the same. From the VS.Net Help on unsafe:
>
>While practically every pointer type construct in C or C++ has a reference type counterpart in C#, there are nonetheless situations where access to pointer types becomes a necessity. For example, interfacing with the underlying operating system, accessing a memory-mapped device, or implementing a time-critical algorithm may not be possible or practical without access to pointers. To address this need, C# provides the ability to write unsafe code.
>
>In unsafe code it is possible to declare and operate on pointers, to perform conversions between pointers and integral types, to take the address of variables, and so forth. In a sense, writing unsafe code is much like writing C code within a C# program.
>
>Code created with C# is still run using the CLR. The CLR gives you some capabilities to handle pointers using the unsafe keyword in its C# modules because MS felt that was required under certain conditions (see above).
>
>What I was referring to in the previous thread was that when you create a C++ project in VS.Net, you have the ability to set a compiler option to either use Managed Extensions (CLR) or not. If you choose not to, you will create a normal VC++ application that requires the VC++ run-time files (e.g. Visual FoxPro) to run.