Pointers

Pointers are a feature.

A pointer is a programming language object that stores the memory address of another value located in computer memory.

the Pointers Wikipedia page
HTML of this page generated by LanguagePage.ts
Improve our Pointers file

Languages without Pointers include Java, JavaScript, Python, Elixir

Languages with Pointers include C, C++, C#, Go, COBOL, Ada, Objective-C, Modula-2, Eiffel, D, Oberon, PL/I, FreeBASIC, Felix, Jule, BlitzMax, Fortran 90

Example from C:

int *ptr;

Example from C++:

int *p;

Example from C#:

// Pointers supported only under certain conditions.
// Get 16 bytes of memory from the process's unmanaged memory
IntPtr pointer = System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal.AllocHGlobal(16);

Example from Go:

package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
  i, j := 42, 2701

  p := &i         // point to i
  fmt.Println(*p) // read i through the pointer
  *p = 21         // set i through the pointer
  fmt.Println(i)  // see the new value of i

  p = &j         // point to j
  *p = *p / 37   // divide j through the pointer
  fmt.Println(j) // see the new value of j
}

Example from Felix:

var x = 1;
&x <- 2;

Example from Jule:

let ptr: *int = nil

Example from Fortran 90:

type real_list_t
  real :: sample_data(100)
  type (real_list_t), pointer :: next => null ()
end type

type (real_list_t), target :: my_real_list
type (real_list_t), pointer :: real_list_temp

real_list_temp => my_real_list
do
  read (1,iostat=ioerr) real_list_temp%sample_data
  if (ioerr /= 0) exit
  allocate (real_list_temp%next)
  real_list_temp => real_list_temp%next
end do

operator-overloading-feature.html · pointers-feature.html · postfix-notation-feature.html

View source