CFDictionary and its derived mutable type, CFMutableDictionary Reference, manage associations of key-value pairs.
FDictionary and its derived mutable type, CFMutableDictionary Reference, manage associations of key-value pairs. CFDictionary creates static dictionaries where you set the key-value pairs when first creating a dictionary and cannot modify them afterward; CFMutableDictionary creates dynamic dictionaries where you can add or delete key-value pairs at any time, and the dictionary automatically allocates memory as needed.
A key-value pair within a dictionary is called an entry. Each entry consists of one object that represents the key and a second object that is that key’s value. Within a dictionary, the keys are unique. That is, no two keys in a single dictionary are equal (as determined by the equal callback). Internally, a dictionary uses a hash table to organize its storage and to provide rapid access to a value given the corresponding key.
Keys for a CFDictionary may be of any C type, however note that if you want to convert a CFPropertyList to XML, any dictionary’s keys must be CFString objects.
