 Type punning

In computer science, type punning is a common term for any programming technique that subverts or circumvents the type system of a programming language in order to achieve an effect that would be difficult or impossible to achieve within the bounds of the formal language.In C and C++, constructs such as pointer type conversion and codice_1 — C++ adds reference type conversion and codice_2 to this list — are provided in order to permit many kinds of type punning, although some kinds are not actually supported by the standard language.