SDL_SaveBMP_IO(3)

🎀 SDL_SaveBMP_IO 🎀

okay bestie, so this is a page from the SDL3 FUNCTIONS manual, and today's main character is SDL_SaveBMP_IO — the girl who takes your surface and yeets it into a BMP. let's get into it 💅

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✨ NAME ✨

SDL_SaveBMP_IO — save a surface to a seekable SDL data stream, in BMP format. that's it, that's the whole vibe 🎀

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

#include <SDL3/SDL_surface.h>

bool SDL_SaveBMP_IO(SDL_Surface *surface, SDL_IOStream *dst, bool closeio);

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💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

okay so here's the tea on how the saving actually goes down 🫖

Surfaces with a 24-bit, 32-bit, and paletted 8-bit format get saved into the BMP directly. no conversion, no detour, straight through. slay ✨

Other RGB formats with 8-bit or higher get converted first:

• to a 24-bit surface, or
• if they have an alpha mask or a colorkey, to a 32-bit surface

...and then they get saved. it's giving "we'll fix your outfit before the photo, don't worry" 💅

and now the part nobody wants to hear 😭

YUV formats, and paletted 1-bit and 4-bit formats, are not supported. periodt. they do not pass the vibe check and they do not get saved.

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🦋 FUNCTION PARAMETERS 🦋

• surface — the SDL_Surface structure holding the image you want to save. this is your girl, your canvas, your moment 👑
• dst — a data stream to save to. the destination, the place where the BMP is gonna live 🏡
• closeio — if true, it calls SDL_CloseIO() on dst before returning, even in the case of an error. so like, yes, it will still close it even if everything went sideways. no cap, that's the deal 🙈

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🌈 RETURN VALUE 🌈

Returns true on success or false on failure — and bestie, if it fails, please call SDL_GetError() for more information. the function will not tell you what went wrong, you gotta go ask 😤

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⭐ THREAD SAFETY ⭐

This function can be called on different threads with different surfaces. so as long as each thread has its own surface, you're good — go be multithreaded, you icon 🧚

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👑 AVAILABILITY 👑

This function is available since SDL 3.2.0. if you're on something older, this is not for you, sorry not sorry 💜

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💀 SEE ALSO 💀

• SDL_LoadBMP_IO(3)
• SDL_SaveBMP(3)

iykyk — load it back, or save it the non-IO way 🌸

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and that's the whole page, bestie!! 🫶 this little manual moment came to you from Simple Directmedia Layer, running SDL 3.4.18, and yeah the page header said SDL_SaveBMP_IO(3) the whole time, we just folded that in up top like a cute little hair clip 🎀✨ go save some BMPs, you're doing amazing 💖