Hi,
I agree that we should strive for a Native-OSGi API which does not
depend on third-party libraries. Having said that, I also think that if
such a C API gets too cumbersome and complicated to use, we should
rethink this requirement.
Without a specific memory ownership management technique (like APR
memory pools), the C API of services obviously needs to be carefully
crafted if the service interface is stateful (e.g. internally keeps a
pointer or reference via a method call). In this case, the service
likely needs to provide additional methods which can be used to clear
the internal state (e.g. signal the withdrawel of a previously passed
pointer because the calling bundle is being unloaded). I don't see a
problem with adapting the original Java service interfaces to better
meet the specifics of C (or C++).
Transferring memory ownership to a service from another bundle probably
needs a mixed approach, if APR memory pools are used internally in C a
implementation like Celix (like Alexander mentioned). But I am not
conviced yet that this problem cannot be overcome by a carefully
designed service interface.
Best,
Sascha
