An object is an internal structure that represents a system resource, such as a file, a thread, or a graphic image. An application cannot directly access the internal structure of an object or the system resource that an object represents. Instead, an application must obtain an object handle and use this handle to examine or modify the system resource (or both). In the Microsoft® Win32® application programming interface (API), handles are usually implemented as indirect pointers, but this is not always the case.