Introduction
So far, this book has examined several types of variables: integers, characters, floating-point numbers plus arrays and structs composed of these simple types. In previous chapters, you have been introduced to pointers and references. In this chapter, we will look at these variables in greater detail.
A pointer is a variable that points to another variable. Pointers have a type; that is, a pointer to int
points to or refers to an int
. A pointer to char
refers to a char
. A pointer to int
can be assigned to another pointer to int
, but not to a pointer to char
. A pointer to class foo
refers to an instance of class foo
. A pointer can also be the special value nullptr
, which means the pointer is not pointing to anything. A reference, which will be discussed in more detail later in this chapter, is a pointer, but with constraints that make it safer to use.
C++ pointers can point to any variable inside any data structure, and can iterate through arrays. To make pointers...