From c110191243174c0baecc10522b8cfbf004b7162b Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: SharoonSharif <150296639+SharoonSharif@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Mon, 21 Sep 2026 19:48:12 -0600
Subject: [PATCH] [pywin32] Fix win32file.ReadFile return types and overlapped
 forms

ReadFile returns bytes, not str: a new bytes object when no OVERLAPPED
is passed, the buffer object itself (or a freshly allocated read buffer
for an int size) when one is. The stub also rejected an OVERLAPPED
together with an int size and accepted only PyOVERLAPPEDReadBuffer as
the buffer, while the runtime takes any writable buffer.
---
 stubs/pywin32/win32/win32file.pyi | 18 +++++++++++++-----
 1 file changed, 13 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-)

diff --git a/stubs/pywin32/win32/win32file.pyi b/stubs/pywin32/win32/win32file.pyi
index 34443c808ade..4cb0def25531 100644
--- a/stubs/pywin32/win32/win32file.pyi
+++ b/stubs/pywin32/win32/win32file.pyi
@@ -1,11 +1,13 @@
-from _typeshed import Incomplete
+from _typeshed import Incomplete, WriteableBuffer
 from socket import socket
-from typing import overload
+from typing import TypeVar, overload
 from typing_extensions import deprecated
 
 import _win32typing
 from win32.lib.pywintypes import TimeType, error as error
 
+_BufferT = TypeVar("_BufferT", bound=_win32typing.PyOVERLAPPEDReadBuffer | WriteableBuffer)
+
 def AreFileApisANSI(): ...
 def CancelIo(handle: int, /) -> None: ...
 def CopyFile(_from: str, to: str, bFailIfExists, /) -> None: ...
@@ -59,11 +61,17 @@ def GetFileSize(): ...
 def AllocateReadBuffer(bufSize: int, /) -> _win32typing.PyOVERLAPPEDReadBuffer: ...
 
 @overload
-def ReadFile(hFile: int, bufSize: int, /) -> tuple[int, str]: ...
+def ReadFile(hFile: int, bufSize: int, overlapped: None = None, /) -> tuple[int, bytes]: ...
+@overload
+def ReadFile(
+    hFile: int, bufSize: int, overlapped: _win32typing.PyOVERLAPPED, /
+) -> tuple[int, _win32typing.PyOVERLAPPEDReadBuffer]: ...
 @overload
 def ReadFile(
-    hFile: int, buffer: _win32typing.PyOVERLAPPEDReadBuffer, overlapped: _win32typing.PyOVERLAPPED | None, /
-) -> tuple[int, str]: ...
+    hFile: int, buffer: _win32typing.PyOVERLAPPEDReadBuffer | WriteableBuffer, overlapped: None = None, /
+) -> tuple[int, bytes]: ...
+@overload
+def ReadFile(hFile: int, buffer: _BufferT, overlapped: _win32typing.PyOVERLAPPED, /) -> tuple[int, _BufferT]: ...
 
 def WriteFile(
     hFile: int, data: str | bytes | _win32typing.PyOVERLAPPEDReadBuffer, ol: _win32typing.PyOVERLAPPED | None = ..., /