diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'docs')
| -rw-r--r-- | docs/types.rst | 24 |
1 files changed, 11 insertions, 13 deletions
diff --git a/docs/types.rst b/docs/types.rst index 400c6fde..2a716e88 100644 --- a/docs/types.rst +++ b/docs/types.rst @@ -218,6 +218,14 @@ Members: It is possible to use an array of bytes as ``byte[]``, but it is wasting a lot of space, 31 bytes every element, to be exact, when passing in calls. It is better to use ``bytes``. +Dynamically-sized byte array +---------------------------- + +``bytes``: + Dynamically-sized byte array, see :ref:`arrays`. Not a value-type! +``string``: + Dynamically-sized UTF-8-encoded string, see :ref:`arrays`. Not a value-type! + .. index:: address, literal;address .. _address_literals: @@ -505,18 +513,6 @@ them can be quite expensive, we have to think about whether we want them to be stored in **memory** (which is not persisting) or **storage** (where the state variables are held). -Dynamically-sized byte array ----------------------------- - -``bytes``: - Dynamically-sized byte array, see :ref:`arrays`. Not a value-type! -``string``: - Dynamically-sized UTF-8-encoded string, see :ref:`arrays`. Not a value-type! - -As a rule of thumb, use ``bytes`` for arbitrary-length raw byte data and ``string`` -for arbitrary-length string (UTF-8) data. If you can limit the length to a certain -number of bytes, always use one of ``bytes1`` to ``bytes32`` because they are much cheaper. - Data location ------------- @@ -602,8 +598,10 @@ shaves off one level in the type from the right). Variables of type ``bytes`` and ``string`` are special arrays. A ``bytes`` is similar to ``byte[]``, but it is packed tightly in calldata. ``string`` is equal to ``bytes`` but does not allow length or index access (for now). - So ``bytes`` should always be preferred over ``byte[]`` because it is cheaper. +As a rule of thumb, use ``bytes`` for arbitrary-length raw byte data and ``string`` +for arbitrary-length string (UTF-8) data. If you can limit the length to a certain +number of bytes, always use one of ``bytes1`` to ``bytes32`` because they are much cheaper. .. note:: If you want to access the byte-representation of a string ``s``, use |