# UnsafeRawBufferPointer A nonowning collection interface to the bytes in a region of memory. ``` @frozen struct UnsafeRawBufferPointer ``` ## Overview You can use an `UnsafeRawBufferPointer` instance in low-level operations to eliminate uniqueness checks and release mode bounds checks. Bounds checks are always performed in debug mode. An `UnsafeRawBufferPointer` instance is a view of the raw bytes in a region of memory. Each byte in memory is viewed as a `UInt8` value independent of the type of values held in that memory. Reading from memory through a raw buffer is an untyped operation. In addition to its collection interface, an `UnsafeRawBufferPointer` instance also supports the `load(fromByteOffset:as:)` and `loadUnaligned(fromByteOffset:as:)` methods provided by `UnsafeRawPointer`, including bounds checks in debug mode. To access the underlying memory through typed operations, the memory must be bound to a trivial type. > Note: A *trivial type* can be copied bit for bit with no indirection > or reference-counting operations. Generally, native Swift types that do > not contain strong or weak references or other forms of indirection are > trivial, as are imported C structs and enums. Copying memory that > contains values of nontrivial types can only be done safely with a typed > pointer. Copying bytes directly from nontrivial, in-memory values does > not produce valid copies and can only be done by calling a C API, such as > `memmove()`. # UnsafeRawBufferPointer Semantics An `UnsafeRawBufferPointer` instance is a view into memory and does not own the memory that it references. Copying a variable or constant of type `UnsafeRawBufferPointer` does not copy the underlying memory. However, initializing another collection with an `UnsafeRawBufferPointer` instance copies bytes out of the referenced memory and into the new collection. The following example uses `someBytes`, an `UnsafeRawBufferPointer` instance, to demonstrate the difference between assigning a buffer pointer and using a buffer pointer as the source for another collection’s elements. Here, the assignment to `destBytes` creates a new, nonowning buffer pointer covering the first `n` bytes of the memory that `someBytes` references—nothing is copied: ``` var destBytes = someBytes[0..