SDL_LockAudioStream(3)

💖 SDL_LockAudioStream 💖

okay bestie, welcome to the SDL3 FUNCTIONS corner of the man pages, where today's main character is SDL_LockAudioStream — the lil function that lets you grab the lock instead of letting the stream handle it all by itself. let's get into it 🎀

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✨ NAME ✨

SDL_LockAudioStream — lock an audio stream for serialized access. yes that's the whole vibe: one lock, one stream, no threading chaos 🔒

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

#include <SDL3/SDL_audio.h>

bool SDL_LockAudioStream(SDL_AudioStream *stream);

look at that signature, so clean, so iconic 💅

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so here's the tea: every single SDL_AudioStream has its own internal mutex, and it uses that mutex to protect its data structures from threading conflicts. this function lets an app lock that mutex directly, which lowkey comes in handy if you're registering callbacks on this stream.

now, most of the time you do not need to lock a stream to use it — the stream manages this lock internally, she's self-sufficient, she's got it 🫶. but (and this is the important part, no cap) this lock is held during callbacks, and those callbacks may run from arbitrary threads at any time. so if your app needs to protect shared data during those callbacks, locking the stream guarantees that the callback is not running while the lock is held. that's the whole point bestie, that's the security ✨

and since this is just a wrapper over SDL_LockMutex for an internal lock, it has all the same attributes — recursive locks are allowed, etc. same energy, different name 🎀

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💜 FUNCTION PARAMETERS 💜

• stream — the audio stream to lock. that's her. that's the one you're locking.

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⭐ RETURN VALUE ⭐

returns true on success or false on failure 😭 and if it fails, call SDL_GetError() for more information — she will tell you what went wrong, just ask her.

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🔥 THREAD SAFETY 🔥

it is safe to call this function from any thread. yes really. any thread. go wild, she can handle it 👑

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🌈 AVAILABILITY 🌈

this function is available since SDL 3.2.0. so if you're on anything older… bestie, update. fr fr 💀

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👑 SEE ALSO 👑

• SDL_UnlockAudioStream(3) — the other half of the equation, the release, the letting go 🕊️

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and that's the page!! tysm for reading, stay locked (the good kind), and remember: this page is brought to you by Simple Directmedia Layer, SDL 3.4.18, and the one and only SDL_LockAudioStream(3) 🎀✨ mwah, go forth and thread safely 💖