Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
A basic example is in the argv argument to the main function in C (and C++), which is given in the prototype as char **argv—this is because the variable argv itself is a pointer to an array of strings (an array of arrays), so *argv is a pointer to the 0th string (by convention the name of the program), and **argv is the 0th character of the ...
In computer science, pointer analysis, or points-to analysis, is a static code analysis technique that establishes which pointers, or heap references, can point to which variables, or storage locations.
In the C programming language, struct is the keyword used to define a composite, a.k.a. record, data type – a named set of values that occupy a block of memory. It allows for the different values to be accessed via a single identifier, often a pointer. A struct can contain other data types so is used for mixed-data-type records.
This kind of type punning is more dangerous than most. Whereas the former example relied only on guarantees made by the C programming language about structure layout and pointer convertibility, the latter example relies on assumptions about a particular system's hardware.
The d-pointer pattern is one of the implementations of the opaque pointer. It is commonly used in C++ classes due to its advantages (noted below). A d-pointer is a private data member of the class that points to an instance of a structure. This method allows class declarations to omit private data members, except for the d-pointer itself. [6]
A function pointer, also called a subroutine pointer or procedure pointer, is a pointer referencing executable code, rather than data. Dereferencing the function pointer yields the referenced function , which can be invoked and passed arguments just as in a normal function call.
In computer programming, an indirection (also called a reference) is a way of referring to something using a name, reference, or container instead of the value itself. The most common form of indirection is the act of manipulating a value through its memory address. For example, accessing a variable through the use of a pointer.
For example, Java and C# were created in part to address some of the perceived type security issues of C, and have "managed" pointers that cannot be used to create invalid references. In its original form (as described by Niklaus Wirth ), Pascal qualifies as a managed pointer language, some 30 years before either Java or C#.