Explain the purpose of the b_needsfree flag. This answers Neals
question (well, two months too late).
diff --git a/Modules/_ctypes/_ctypes.c b/Modules/_ctypes/_ctypes.c
index 5306456..941da0b 100644
--- a/Modules/_ctypes/_ctypes.c
+++ b/Modules/_ctypes/_ctypes.c
@@ -2181,7 +2181,12 @@
if ((size_t)dict->size <= sizeof(obj->b_value)) {
/* No need to call malloc, can use the default buffer */
obj->b_ptr = (char *)&obj->b_value;
- /* XXX(nnorwitz): shouldn't b_needsfree be 0? */
+ /* The b_needsfree flag does not mean that we actually did
+ call PyMem_Malloc to allocate the memory block; instead it
+ means we are the *owner* of the memory and are responsible
+ for freeing resources associated with the memory. This is
+ also the reason that b_needsfree is exposed to Python.
+ */
obj->b_needsfree = 1;
} else {
/* In python 2.4, and ctypes 0.9.6, the malloc call took about