NSCopying
E820269
NSCopying is an Objective-C protocol that defines the interface for creating immutable copies of objects.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| NSCopying canonical | 34 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T9761572 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: NSCopying Context triple: [NSString, conformsToProtocol, NSCopying]
-
A.
NSCoder
NSCoder is an abstract class in Apple’s Foundation framework that provides an interface for encoding and decoding objects and values for archiving and serialization.
-
B.
NSObject
NSObject is the root base class in Objective-C from which most classes in Cocoa and Cocoa Touch inherit, providing fundamental object behavior such as memory management and message sending.
-
C.
NSString
NSString is an Objective-C class representing immutable Unicode strings, widely used as the primary string type in Apple’s Cocoa and Cocoa Touch frameworks.
-
D.
Copia
Copia was a later Roman colony in southern Italy that succeeded the ancient Greek city of Thurii.
-
E.
NSData
NSData is a fundamental Objective-C class in Apple’s Foundation framework that represents immutable raw binary data.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: NSCopying Target entity description: NSCopying is an Objective-C protocol that defines the interface for creating immutable copies of objects.
-
A.
NSCoder
NSCoder is an abstract class in Apple’s Foundation framework that provides an interface for encoding and decoding objects and values for archiving and serialization.
-
B.
NSObject
NSObject is the root base class in Objective-C from which most classes in Cocoa and Cocoa Touch inherit, providing fundamental object behavior such as memory management and message sending.
-
C.
NSString
NSString is an Objective-C class representing immutable Unicode strings, widely used as the primary string type in Apple’s Cocoa and Cocoa Touch frameworks.
-
D.
Copia
Copia was a later Roman colony in southern Italy that succeeded the ancient Greek city of Thurii.
-
E.
NSData
NSData is a fundamental Objective-C class in Apple’s Foundation framework that represents immutable raw binary data.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (36)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
Objective-C protocol
ⓘ
programming interface ⓘ |
| availableOnPlatform |
iOS
ⓘ
macOS ⓘ tvOS ⓘ watchOS ⓘ |
| category | object copying ⓘ |
| conformsTo | NSObject protocol ⓘ |
| copySemanticsDefinedBy | class implementation ⓘ |
| copyType | immutable copy ⓘ |
| declaredInHeader | Foundation/NSObjCRuntime.h ⓘ |
| definedInFramework | Foundation framework ⓘ |
| definedInLanguage | Objective-C ⓘ |
| documentationURL | https://developer.apple.com/documentation/foundation/nscopying ⓘ |
| errorIfNotImplemented | unrecognized selector -copyWithZone: ⓘ |
| introducedBy | Apple Inc. ⓘ |
| invokedByFunction | [object copy] ⓘ |
| invokedByMethod | -copy ⓘ |
| languageBinding | Swift NSCopying protocol ⓘ |
| memoryManagementModel | reference-counted objects ⓘ |
| methodParameter | NSZone *zone ⓘ |
| methodRequirement | -copyWithZone: ⓘ |
| methodReturnType | id ⓘ |
| oftenImplementedWith | -mutableCopyWithZone: (from NSMutableCopying) ⓘ |
| purpose | define interface for creating immutable copies of objects ⓘ |
| relatedConcept |
deep copy
ⓘ
shallow copy ⓘ |
| relatedProtocol | NSMutableCopying ⓘ |
| requires | objects to return an autoreleased copy ⓘ |
| requiresImplementationIn | custom Objective-C classes that support copying ⓘ |
| usedBy |
Cocoa Touch classes
ⓘ
Cocoa classes ⓘ Foundation classes ⓘ |
| usedFor | copying Objective-C objects ⓘ |
| usedInPattern |
immutable model objects
ⓘ
value object pattern ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: NSCopying Description of subject: NSCopying is an Objective-C protocol that defines the interface for creating immutable copies of objects.
Referenced by (34)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.