Chapter
Pointers
In the preceding chapters our programs have b een written to access ob jects directly i e using
the variable names Wehave p ostp oned until now a discussion of the concept of indirect access
i e access of ob jects using their address As wehave seen variables lo cal to a function may
b e accessed using their name only within that function When arguments are passed to another
function only the values are passed and the cal led function may use these values but cannot
a ect the variable cells in the cal ling function Sometimes however a function needs to have
direct access to the cells in another function This can b e done in C through indirect access using
the address of the cell called a p ointer
In this chapter we will intro duce the concepts of indirect access p ointer typ es and dereferenced
p ointer variables We will use these concepts to write functions that indirectly access ob jects in a
calling function