C++ Class or Struct compatiblity with C struct

Question

Is it possible to write a C++ class or struct that is fully compatible with C struct. From compatibility I mean size of the object and memory locations of the variables. I know that its evil to use *(point*)&pnt or even (float*)&pnt (on a different case where variables are floats) but consider that its really required for the performance sake. Its not logical to use regular type casting operator million times per second.

Take this example

Class Point {
    long x,y;
    Point(long x, long y) {
        this->x=x;
        this->y=y;
    }

    float Distance(Point &point) {
        return ....;
    }
};

C version is a POD struct

struct point {
    long x,y;
};

Answer 1

The cleanest was to do this is to inherit from the C struct:

struct point
{
    long x, y;
};

class Point : public struct point
{
  public:
    Point(long x, long y)
        {    this->x=x; this->y=y; }

    float Distance(Point &point)
        {                return ....;        }
}

The C++ compiler guarantees the C style struct point has the same layout as with the C compiler. The C++ class Point inherits this layout for its base class portion (and since it adds no data or virtual members, it will have the same layout). A pointer to class Point will be converted to a pointer to struct point without a cast, since conversion to a base class pointer is always supported. So, you can use class Point objects and freely pass pointers to them to C functions expecting a pointer to struct point.

Of course, if there is already a C header file defining struct point, then you can just include this instead of repeating the definition.