Natural alignment, for example, on a word boundary at 0x1004. The ARM compiler normally aligns variables and pads structures so that these items are accessed efficiently using LDR and STR instructions.

Known but non-natural alignment, for example, a word at address 0x1001. This type of alignment commonly occurs when structures are packed to remove unnecessary padding. In C and C++, the __packed qualifier or the #pragma pack(n) pragma is used to signify that a structure is packed.

Unknown alignment, for example, a word at an arbitrary address. This type of alignment commonly occurs when defining a pointer that can point to a word at any address. In C and C++, the __packed qualifier or the #pragma pack(n) pragma is used to signify that a pointer can access a word on a non-natural alignment boundary.