How can I get swig to wrap a linked list-type structure?

Question

Here's what I take to be a pretty standard header for a list. Because the struct points to itself, we need this two-part declaration. Call it listicle.h:

typedef struct _listicle listicle;

struct _listicle{
    int i;
    listicle *next;
};    

I'm trying to get swig to wrap this, so that the Python user can make use of the listicle struct. Here's what I have in listicle.i right now:

%module listicle

%{
#include "listicle.h"
%}

%include listicle.h
%rename(listicle) _listicle;

%extend listicle {
    listicle() {return malloc (sizeof(listicle));}
}

As you can tell by my being here asking, it doesn't work. All the various combinations I've tried each fail in their own special way. [This one: %extend defined for an undeclared class listicle. Change it to %extend _listicle (and fix the constructor) and loading in Python gives type object '_listicle' has no attribute '_listicle_swigregister'. And so on.]

Suggestions?

Answer 1

Maybe you could ignore the next pointer in the python code, and just have a next() function which you call in python? Or maybe I'm not understanding what the problem is...