Pointers : what are they pointing to?

Pointers in C

Pointers are a fundamental concept in C programming that enable you to directly access and manipulate memory. Understanding pointers is crucial for effective and efficient C programming.

What is a Pointer?

A pointer is a value that represents a memory address. It points to a specific memory location, allowing you to access and modify the value stored at that location.

Basic Example

int some_var = 4;
int *pointer_to_some_var = &some_var;

here &some_var is address of some_var;

Symbol	Function	Example
some_variable	Holds the value in certain memory location	int x = 3;
*	Points to memory address of a certain variable	int *pX;
&	Holds the value of address of following variable	&x;

references and De-referencing

Symbols	what it holds/means
Declared variable	Value of the variable
pointer to the variable(*)	Value of the variable pointed to
Address of the variable(&)	Memory location of variable(eg:0x7ffe2f14f97c )
Pointers name itself(pointer variable)	Memory address of pointer (eg:0x7ffe2f14f97c)

Why use Pointers?

Pointers help manage scope issues, especially when using functions with structures. By using pointers, you can access out-of-scope variables in functions through their memory addresses.

We use pointers to access out of scope variables in functions by providing pointer pointing to memory address of such variable (or structure).

Example

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdbool.h>

struct employee_type
{
    int id;
    int income;
    bool staff;
};

void initialize_employee(struct employee_type *e){
    e->id = 0;
    e->income=0;
    e->staff=true;

    return;
}
int main(){
    struct employee_type Ralph;    
    initialize_employee(&Ralph);

    printf("%d", Ralph.income);
}

Common Pitfalls

• Uninitialized Pointers: Always initialize pointers. An uninitialized pointer points to a random memory location, leading to undefined behavior.

• Dangling Pointers: Do not use pointers to memory that has been freed or gone out of scope.

• Pointer Arithmetic: Be careful with pointer arithmetic to avoid accessing memory out of bounds.