Pointer (computer programming)

Are you an EPFL student looking for a semester project?

Work with us on data science and visualisation projects, and deploy your project as an app on top of GraphSearch.

In computer science, a pointer is an object in many programming languages that stores a memory address. This can be that of another value located in computer memory, or in some cases, that of memory-mapped computer hardware. A pointer references a location in memory, and obtaining the value stored at that location is known as dereferencing the pointer. As an analogy, a page number in a book's index could be considered a pointer to the corresponding page; dereferencing such a pointer would be done by flipping to the page with the given page number and reading the text found on that page. The actual format and content of a pointer variable is dependent on the underlying computer architecture. Using pointers significantly improves performance for repetitive operations, like traversing iterable data structures (e.g. strings, lookup tables, control tables and tree structures). In particular, it is often much cheaper in time and space to copy and dereference pointers than it is to copy and access the data to which the pointers point. Pointers are also used to hold the addresses of entry points for called subroutines in procedural programming and for run-time linking to dynamic link libraries (DLLs). In object-oriented programming, pointers to functions are used for binding methods, often using virtual method tables. A pointer is a simple, more concrete implementation of the more abstract reference data type. Several languages, especially low-level languages, support some type of pointer, although some have more restrictions on their use than others. While "pointer" has been used to refer to references in general, it more properly applies to data structures whose interface explicitly allows the pointer to be manipulated (arithmetically via ) as a memory address, as opposed to a magic cookie or capability which does not allow such. Because pointers allow both protected and unprotected access to memory addresses, there are risks associated with using them, particularly in the latter case.

About this result

This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.

Related people (1)

Related concepts (181)

Related courses (38)

Related lectures (330)

Related MOOCs (2)

Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming in C++

Le cours suivi propose une introduction aux concepts de base de la programmation orientée objet tels que : encapsulation et abstraction, classes/objets, attributs/méthodes, héritage, polymorphisme, ..

Introduction to Programming in C++

Ce cours initie à la programmation en utilisant le langage C++. Il ne présuppose pas de connaissance préalable. Les aspects plus avancés (programmation orientée objet) sont donnés dans un cours suivan

MICRO-210: Microcontrollers

Microcontrôleurs couvre le fonctionnement interne d'un microcontrôleur, des notions de base d'architecture de processeur et de système informatique ainsi que les interfaces de microcontrôleurs, et pro

CS-119(c): Information, Computation, Communication

L'objectif de ce cours est d'introduire les étudiants à la pensée algorithmique, de les familiariser avec les fondamentaux de l'Informatique et de développer une première compétence en programmation (

CS-207: System oriented programming

Cours de programmation en langage C se focalisant sur l'utilisation des ressources système, en particulier la gestion de la mémoire (pointeurs).

Pointers: Basics and Applications

Covers the basics of pointers in C, including memory management, structures, functions, and arrays.

Pointers and Memory Management

Covers pointers in C++, memory addresses, dynamic allocation, arrays, and memory management techniques.

Pointers and Arrays: Arithmetic, Buffer Overflow

Covers the arithmetic of pointers, the relationship between pointers and arrays, and the concept of buffer overflow in C programming.

Linked list

In computer science, a linked list is a linear collection of data elements whose order is not given by their physical placement in memory. Instead, each element points to the next. It is a data structure consisting of a collection of nodes which together represent a sequence. In its most basic form, each node contains data, and a reference (in other words, a link) to the next node in the sequence. This structure allows for efficient insertion or removal of elements from any position in the sequence during iteration.

Buffer overflow

In programming and information security, a buffer overflow or buffer overrun is an anomaly whereby a program writes data to a buffer beyond the buffer's allocated memory, overwriting adjacent memory locations. Buffers are areas of memory set aside to hold data, often while moving it from one section of a program to another, or between programs. Buffer overflows can often be triggered by malformed inputs; if one assumes all inputs will be smaller than a certain size and the buffer is created to be that size, then an anomalous transaction that produces more data could cause it to write past the end of the buffer.

Primitive data type

In computer science, primitive data types are a set of basic data types from which all other data types are constructed. Specifically it often refers to the limited set of data representations in use by a particular processor, which all compiled programs must use. Most processors support a similar set of primitive data types, although the specific representations vary. More generally, "primitive data types" may refer to the standard data types built into a programming language (built-in types).