How do you release memory acquired via bgfx?

[sycc90]

For example, let's say I have the following pseudo code:

try {
    bgfx::Memory* mem = bgfx::alloc(size);
    fill_with_data(mem); // this fails and throws
    handle = bgfx::createShader(mem);
}
catch (...) {
    // How do I release the memory?
}

Looking through the sources, it seems like the answer would be to use bx::free. But I'm worried I'm missing something here and there's a reason for not having some kind of bgfx::dealloc or so.

Am I misunderstanding something really basic here?

Edit: just to clarify. I understand that if you pass the memory to bgfx then it will be released internally. But I'm talking about something happening between the allocation and sending it, which prevents you from doing so. Like the exception in the example above.

[bkaradzic]

There is no way. You must pass data to bgfx. Change your code to load without failure before allocating memory.

You can manage memory yourself, and then use bgfx::makeRef to pass it into bgfx and use _releaseFn callback to release it once bgfx consumes it: https://bkaradzic.github.io/bgfx/bgfx.html#namespacebgfx_1a8dc7bf9f26afcc6f61dc602dfed09044

[sycc90]

Just out of curiosity, is there any technical reason for not allowing the users to release it?

It's not a big deal because I can just use makeRef like you said, and if I want to forget about it then just set the delete/destroy/whatever in _releaseFn. But I was curious about it, since I'm always very mindful about memory management across failure conditions.

Also, thank you very much for the fast reply! I actually sent that and went to bed cause I imagined it'd be days.

[bkaradzic]

Memory API is designed around avoiding unnecessary copying. In many non-trivial cases user would just use bgfx::makeRef since that gives user ability to control lifespan. bgfx::alloc and bgfx::copy are there just for convenience. Adding bgfx::dealloc or something similar would just cause confusing about deallocating.

mem = bgfx::alloc...
handle = bgfx::create...(mem...);
// does user call bgfx::dealloc here?! or bgfx::dealloc is special case?!