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ctypes: bit field data does not survive round trip #97588

@matthiasgoergens

Description

@matthiasgoergens

Bit-fields in structures don't seem to give you back the data you put in?

from ctypes import Structure, c_uint, c_ulonglong, c_ushort


class Foo(Structure):
    _fields_ = [("A", c_uint, 1), ("B", c_ushort, 16)]


class Bar(Structure):
    _fields_ = [("A", c_ulonglong, 1), ("B", c_uint, 32)]


if __name__ == "__main__":
    for a in [Foo(), Bar()]:
        a.A = 0
        a.B = 1
        print(a.A, a.B)

The above should print

0 1
0 1

But it actually prints

$ python3.10 mini.py 
0 0
0 0

For comparison and to test my understanding, I expect the following C code to be equivalent to the Python code above:

#include<stdio.h>

struct Foo {
  unsigned int A: 1;
  unsigned short B: 16;
};

struct Bar {
  unsigned long long int A: 1;
  unsigned int B: 32;
};

int main(int argc, char** argv) {
    struct Foo foo;
    foo.A = 0;
    foo.B = 1;
    printf("%d %d\n", foo.A, foo.B);

    struct Bar bar;
    bar.A = 0;
    bar.B = 1;
    printf("%d %d\n", bar.A, bar.B);
    return 0;
}

The C version prints what we expect:

$ gcc -fsanitize=undefined test.c && ./a.out
0 1
0 1

Your environment

I am on ArchLinux with Python 3.10.7. Python 3.11 and main are also affected. I also randomly tried Python 3.6 with the same result. (Python 3.6 is the oldest one that was easy to install.)

More comprehensive test case

Here's how I actually found the problem reported above. Using Hypothesis:

import ctypes
import string

from hypothesis import assume, example, given, note
from hypothesis import strategies as st

unsigned = [(ctypes.c_ushort, 16), (ctypes.c_uint, 32), (ctypes.c_ulonglong, 64)]
signed = [(ctypes.c_short, 16), (ctypes.c_int, 32), (ctypes.c_longlong, 64)]
types = unsigned + signed

unsigned_types = list(zip(*unsigned))[0]
signed_types = list(zip(*signed))[0]

names = st.lists(st.text(alphabet=string.ascii_letters, min_size=1), unique=True)


@st.composite
def fields_and_set(draw):
    names_ = draw(names)
    ops = []
    results = []
    for name in names_:
        t, l = draw(st.sampled_from(types))
        res = (name, t, draw(st.integers(min_value=1, max_value=l)))
        results.append(res)
        values = draw(st.lists(st.integers()))
        for value in values:
            ops.append((res, value))
    ops = draw(st.permutations(ops))
    return results, ops


def fit_in_bits(value, type_, size):
    expect = value % (2**size)
    if type_ not in unsigned_types:
        if expect >= 2 ** (size - 1):
            expect -= 2**size
    return expect


@given(fops=fields_and_set())
def test(fops):
    (fields, ops) = fops

    class BITS(ctypes.Structure):
        _fields_ = fields

    b = BITS()
    for (name, type_, size), value in ops:

        expect = fit_in_bits(value, type_, size)
        setattr(b, name, value)
        j = getattr(b, name)
        assert expect == j, f"{expect} != {j}"


if __name__ == "__main__":
    test()

Thanks to @mdickinson for pointing me in this direction.

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