Pointer to a string in C

Question

char  ptrChar    I know that ptrChar is a pointer to char  What s the command for a pointer to string   Edit  If it s the same  ptr to char vs  ptr to string      what does the variable definition below represent   char   ptr  N     I m confused

User · Answer

The very same  A C string is nothing but an array of characters  so a pointer to a string is a pointer to an array of characters  And a pointer to an array is the very same as a pointer to its first element

User · Answer

The string is basically bounded from the place where it is pointed to  char  ptrChar    to the null character   0  The char  ptrChar  actually points to the beginning of the string  char array   and thus that is the pointer to that string  so when you do like ptrChar x  for example  you actually access the memory location x times after the beginning of the char  aka from where ptrChar is pointing to

User · Answer

The same notation is used for pointing at a single character or the first character of a null-terminated string   char c    Z   char a      Hello world    char  ptr1    amp c  char  ptr2   a          Points to the  H  of  Hello world  char  ptr3    amp a 0       Also points to the  H  of  Hello world  char  ptr4    amp a 6       Points to the  w  of  world  char  ptr5   a   6      Also points to the  w  of  world    The values in ptr2 and ptr3 are the same  so are the values in ptr4 and ptr5   If you re going to treat some data as a string  it is important to make sure it is null terminated  and that you know how much space there is for you to use   Many problems are caused by not understanding what space is available and not knowing whether the string was properly null terminated   Note that all the pointers above can be dereferenced as if they were an array     ptr1        Z    ptr1 0      Z     ptr2        H    ptr2 0      H    ptr2 4      o     ptr4        w    ptr4 0      w    ptr4 4      d     ptr5 0       ptr3 6    ptr5 0       ptr3 6      Late addition to question     What does char   ptr  N   represent    This is a more complex beastie altogether   It is a pointer to an array of N characters   The type is quite different  the way it is used is quite different  the size of the object pointed to is quite different   char   ptr  12     amp a     ptr  0      H    ptr  6      w      ptr   6      w    Note that ptr   1 points to undefined territory  but points  one array of 12 bytes  beyond the start of a   Given a slightly different scenario   char b 3  12       Hello world    Farewell    Au revoir      char   pb  12     amp b 0     Now      pb 0   0      H     pb 1   0      F     pb 2   5      v    You probably won t come across pointers to arrays except by accident for quite some time  I ve used them a few times in the last 25 years  but so few that I can count the occasions on the fingers of one hand  and several of those have been answering questions on Stack Overflow    Beyond knowing that they exist  that they are the result of taking the address of an array  and that you probably didn t want it  you don t really need to know more about pointers to arrays

[c] Pointer to a string in C?

Examples related to c

Examples related to string

Examples related to pointers