Module buffer_view 

Type-safe buffer reinterpretation for device memory.

This module provides BufferView and BufferViewMut, which allow reinterpreting a DeviceBuffer<T> as a different element type U without copying data. This is useful for viewing a buffer of f32 values as u32 (e.g., for bitwise operations in a kernel), or for interpreting raw byte buffers as structured types.

Size and alignment constraints

The total byte size of the original buffer must be evenly divisible by std::mem::size_of::<U>(), and the buffer’s device pointer must be aligned to std::mem::align_of::<U>(). If either constraint is violated, the view creation returns CudaError::InvalidValue. Allocations made via cuMemAlloc-backed buffers (e.g. DeviceBuffer::alloc) are always sufficiently aligned for any U no larger than the CUDA driver’s allocation alignment guarantee, so this only rejects genuinely misaligned reinterpretations (e.g. viewing a byte-offset sub-buffer as a wider type).

Example

let buf = DeviceBuffer::<f32>::alloc(256)?;
// Reinterpret as u32 (same size, different type)
let view: BufferView<'_, u32> = buf.view_as::<u32>()?;
assert_eq!(view.len(), 256);

Structs

BufferView

An immutable, type-reinterpreted view into a DeviceBuffer.

BufferViewMut

A mutable, type-reinterpreted view into a DeviceBuffer.