[edusperoni]

Adoption step 0 of rfcs#58 ("interop and runtime helpers"). interop moves into builtin modules, and the global interop becomes a compat layer built from them. Android counterpart: NativeScript/android#2074.

Modules

Module	Exports
ns:interop	Pointer, Reference, FunctionReference, sizeof, alloc, free, handleof, stringFromCString, types (the C primitives: void, bool, int8…uint64, ulong, slong, float, double)
ns:interop/ios (also ns:interop/visionos, ns:interop/macos)	adopt, bufferFromData, types (id, class, selector, protocol, unichar, noop)
ns:runtime (new members)	escapeException, setExternalSize, getExternalSize

• Exports and their types objects are frozen, like the other ns: modules.
• The aliases resolve to ns:interop/ios before any cache lookup, so require returns the same exports object and ESM gets the same module (one namespace object).

The global interop

• Built by runtime/js/interop-global.js, which requires the three modules through the builtin require. The ns: files never refer to it.
• Same key set as today, and every member (including all 20 types) is === its module export.
• The object is still mutable, and the interop property is still enumerable.
• It's now a lazy global (kLazyGlobals), built on first read. No C++ reads it.
• inline-functions.js (the @ObjCMethod/@ObjCParam decorators) gets void from ns:interop at decorator time, so apps that never touch interop don't build these modules.

Native changes

• The 20 type objects are created once per isolate, on first use (a StateFor slot). GetInteropType hands them out when marshalling pointer and C-string results, so they have to exist even if no JS ever loads ns:interop. noop still wins the shared void encoding.
• Workers no longer register interop twice. They used to end up with two sets of type objects, so the marshaller's types and interop.types were different objects. There's now one set per isolate.
• Pointer, Reference, FunctionReference and Unmanaged already create their constructors lazily, so native marshalling never depends on the module having loaded.

Types

• types/ns-interop.d.ts and types/ns-interop-ios.d.ts, plus the ns:runtime additions, all shipped with the runtime and referenced from types/index.d.ts.
• Pointer, Reference<T>, FunctionReference<T>, Type<T>, StructType<T>, Unmanaged<T> and AdoptedPointer are module exports. That means generated declarations can write import type * as interop from "ns:interop" and keep their existing interop.Pointer references unchanged.
• bufferFromData(data: NSData & object) relies on an empty global interface NSData {}.
  • With @nativescript/types-ios in the program, it merges into that package's NSData class.
  • Without it, any object is accepted.
• The global interop declaration stays in @nativescript/types-ios. Switching it to alias these modules is a follow-up there.

Tests

• New NsInteropTests.js, with a worker fixture and an ESM fixture. It covers:
  • export key sets;
  • frozen exports;
  • alias identity under require, static import and dynamic import();
  • that the global's key set is unchanged and every member is === its module export, on the main thread and in a worker.
• Results:
  • Full suite: 1853 passed, 0 failed. Baseline was 1835, and the 18 new specs account for the difference.
  • ASan: 1853 passed, 0 failed, no reports.

Open points

• Error messages still say interop.setExternalSize … / interop.escapeException …, including when called through ns:runtime. They were left as-is because existing tests and docs match on them.
• interop.initializer / interop.Args (rfcs#56) aren't on main yet. They'll join ns:interop when that lands.

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