This sort of approach is a pain to use, because you keep having to cast when you're in the debugger, and there's zero type safety. And I'm afraid I don't have m

This sort of approach is a pain to use, because you keep having to cast when you're in the debugger, and there's zero type safety. And I'm afraid I don't have much positive to say about something like "((Vector2i * )arr3->data)[0].x = 333". You can do better than this! What is an array? It's 3 variables: base, length and capacity. So why not decide that an array is just that. 3 variables of the right size and type. #define ARRAY(T,S) T S;size_t S##_length;size_t S##_capacity Then you can make one like this: ARRAY(int,xs); You'll also need to initialise and these destroy array "objects". #define ARRAY_INIT(S) \ do { \ S=NULL; \ (S##_length)=0; \ (S##_capacity)=0; \ } while(0) #define ARRAY_DESTROY(S) \ do { \ Array_Free(S); \ ARRAY_INIT(S); \ } while(0) Add you'll probably want to add an item to an array too. #define ARRAY_ADD(S,X) \ do { \ if((S##_length)>=(S##_capacity)) { \ S=Array_Grow(S, \ sizeof *S, \ &(S##_length), \ &(S##_capacity)); \ S[S##_length++]=(X); \ } while(0) So you might use them like this: ARRAY(int,xs); ARRAY_INIT(xs); for(int i=0;i<100;++i) ARRAY_ADD(xs,i); ARRAY_DESTROY(xs); Array_Free is very simple, and Array_Grow is barely more complicated (however I wrote it off the cuff, so of course it could still be wrong). Both of these mainly exist just to keep stdlib.h out of the header. void Array_Free(void *p) { free(p); } void *Array_Grow(void *base,size_t stride,size_t *length,size_t *capacity) { *capacity+=*capacity/2; *capacity=MAX(*capacity,MAX(MIN_CAPACITY,*length)); return realloc(base,*capacity*stride); } Array accesses and iteration and the like are just done in the traditional way: for(size_t i=0;i<xs_length;++i) { printf("%d\n",xs[i]); } Even performs nicely with -O0. For a full implementation you'll probably also need a way of generating a static array. (I mainly found myself needing this for test code, which uses globals for convenience; most arrays I create normally are locals, or parts of structs.) You'll also need a parameters list for use in a function declaration or definition, and a macro that expands to all 3 variables. #define ARRAY_PARAMS(T,S) T *S,size_t S##_length,size_t S##_capacity #define ARRAY_ARG(S) S,S##_length,S##_capacity Like then you might have a function that takes a pointer to an "array": void FunctionThatTakesAnArray(ARRAY_PARAMS(T,*p)); And you call it like this: ARRAY(T,myarray); FunctionThatTakesAnArray(ARRAY_ARG(&myarray)); (I found this cropped up often enough that I needed the macro, but it was less common than I thought.) There's more you can do, but the above is the long and the short of it. This might all look terrible - or perhaps it sort of looks OK, but you're just not sure that it would actually work - but I've used this in a prototype project and thought it worked out well. (I've been using C for 20+ years, so hopefully even if I've got no taste, I've at least got a rough feel for what works out OK and what's going to end up a disaster.)