Introduction to Programming

Pointers
Phạm Nguyên Khang
Department of Computer Science
pnkhang@cit.ctu.edu.vn

5/2021
 Contents
• Pointers
• Pointers & Arrays
• Pointers & Function
• Dynamic Memory Allocation
• Null, Void and Double Pointers
• Practice

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Pointers

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 Pointers
• Variable & Address
• Every variable (var) has its address (&var) in
memory
– &: reference operator
– You have seen it in scanf function

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Pointers

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 Pointers
• Results

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Pointers

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 Pointers
• Results

• Notice:
– You may obtain different value of address while using
this code.
– In above source code, value 5 is stored in the memory
location 0x7fff5c242bb8. var is just the name given to
that location.

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 Pointers
• Pointer Variables
– special variable that stores just the address of
another variable. It is called Pointer variable or,
simply, a pointer.

p p is a pointer variable of type int.

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 Pointers
• Reference operator (&) and Dereference
operator (*)
– &:reference operator. It gives you the address of a
variable.
– *: dereference operator. It gives you the value
from the address.
• Note:
– The * sign when declaring a pointer is not a
dereference operator.
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 Pointers
• Results

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 Pointers
• Assign a pointer to another
q

p a

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 Pointers
• Assign a pointer to another
q

p a

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 Pointers
• Assign a pointer to another
q

p a

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Pointers & Arrays

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 Pointers & Arrays
• Arrays are closely related to pointers in C
programming
• A pointer variable takes different addresses as
value whereas, in case of array it is fixed.

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Pointers & Arrays

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 Pointers & Arrays
• Results

• Try to with an array of int or float or double to

see how addresses change!

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 Pointers & Arrays
• Relation between Arrays and Pointers

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 Pointers & Arrays
• Name of the array always points to address of
the first element of an array.
• For example: arr and &arr[0] points to the
address of the first element.

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 Pointers & Arrays

• You can declare an array and can use pointer

to alter the data of an array!

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 Pointers & Arrays
• Result

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 Pointers & Arrays
• Relation between Arrays and Pointers

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 Pointers & Arrays
• Operators on Pointers

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 Pointers & Arrays
• Operators on Pointers
– p is a pointer of type T
– p++ or p = p + 1 move the pointer an offset of
sizeof(T)

1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte

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 Pointers & Arrays
• Operators on Pointers
– p is a pointer of type T
– p++ or p = p + 1 move the pointer an offset of
sizeof(T)

1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte 1 byte

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Pointers & Functions

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 Pointers & Functions
• Write a program to swap two numbers

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 Pointers & Functions
• Write a program to swap two numbers using
function

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Why doesn’t it work as we want ?

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 a b

temp

num1 num2

5 10
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 a b

5 10

temp

copy

num1 num2

5 10
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 a b

5 10

temp

num1 num2

5 10
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 Pointers & Functions
• swap cannot modify of num1 and num2
because it receive only value of num1 and
num2.
• We cannot access a local variable outside its
scope (by using its name)

• Solution: using address of the variable instead

of its name
– Pass address of num1 and num2 to swap.

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a b

temp

num1 num2

5 10
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 a b

temp

refer to

num1 num2

5 10
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 Pointers & Functions
• Parameter passing: copy value of arguments
to parameters
• Cannot access a variable outside its scope
using its name
• Always access any variable using its address.

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 Pointers & Functions
• Pointers as return value of functions

Address must be a
“valid” address

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Dynamic Memory Allocation

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 Dynamic Memory Allocation
• Size of array must have been known at
compile time.
• Size of the array can be insufficient or more
than required.

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 Dynamic Memory Allocation
• Write a program to enter n float numbers,
store them for later use.

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Dynamic Memory Allocation

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 Dynamic Memory Allocation
• What if the user enter
–n=3? Waste of memory
– Or n = 100 ? Insufficient

è Dynamic memory allocation

– allows your program to obtain more memory
space while running, or to release it if it's not
required.

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 Dynamic Memory Allocation
Functio Use of function
n
malloc() Allocates requested size of bytes and returns
a pointer first byte of allocated space
calloc() Allocates space for an array elements,
initializes to zero and then returns a pointer
to memory
free() Deallocate the previously allocated space
realloc() Change the size of previously allocated space

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 Dynamic Memory Allocation
• Example:

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 Null, Void and Double Pointers
• Null pointer
– Pointer point to nothing, contains 0
• Void pointer (void*)
– General Purpose Pointer
– It does not have any data type associated with it
– It can store address of any type of variable
– A void pointer is a C convention for a raw address

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Void Pointers

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 Double Pointers
• Pointer to another pointer

• Double Pointer stores the

address of the Pointer Variable

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 Practice
1. Write a program to realize followings:
- Declare a integer variable named balance.
- Declare a pointer to integer named address.
- Store the address of balance to address.
- Store 5 to balance.
- Print on the screen: value of balance, address of balance
- Print on the screen: value of address, content of memory
cell where address points to.
- Assign 10 to memory cell where address points to.
- Print on the screen: value of balance, content (value)of
memory cell where address points to.

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 Practice
1. Complete this program to enter 5 integers,
stores them in array A, then prints them on the
screen using pointer instead of [] operator.

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 Practice
3. Consider the code in the following page.
a. Add your code in functions foo1 and foo2
b. Compile and run, observe and explain obtained
results.

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 Practice
4. Write a function ADD with void as returned
type, 3 integer parameters: a, b, c. This function
compute a + b and store the result to c. Write
the main() function to use this function.

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 Practice
5. Write a program to do followings:
– Declare a integer variable n.
– Declare a pointer to float p.
– Have the user enter the value of n (scanf, n < 10)
– Allocate n floats (use malloc()) to p.
– Assign 1/1, 1/2, 1/3, …, 1/n to elements of p (use
pointer movement)
– Print n elements to the screen using [] operator (point
is used as array)
– Deallocate p (use free())

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 Practice
6. Write a function void UPDATE(n, p) to allocate n
integer numbers for p (p is a pointer).
Write main() function to do the followings:
– Declare a pointer to integer q.
– Declare a integer variable n.
– Have the user enter value of n (scanf(), n ~ 1000)
– call UPDATE function to allocate memory for q.
– assign 2, 4, 6, 8, … to elements of q.
– Compute sum of elements of q, print it to the screen
– Deallocate p.

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 Practice
7. Write a program in C to find the largest
element (integers) using Dynamic Memory
Allocation.
Require: Enter n numbers and store them in a
dynamic array.

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 Practice
8. Write a program in C to print the elements of a
dynamic array in reverse order using dynamic
memory allocation and pointers.

9. Write a function int *dec2bin(int n) to convert a

number in decimal into binary.
Hint:
– Declare a pointer in dec2bin: int * p;
– Allocate memory for p (use malloc())
– Store binary digits of n in p
– return p.
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 Practice
10. Write a program to use an array of pointers
instead of 2D array.
A pB
5 2 3 5 2 3
4 7 1
4 7 1

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