Unit 5 Pointers

Pointers in modern c++

• What do they do?

  • Varible that store addresses of other varibles (their location in ram)

  • Pointer declaration/initialization

  • Adress (&) and indirection (*) pointer opnerators

  • Pointers vs. refrences

  • Pass by refrence with pointers

  • Built-in pointer-based arrays

  • Pointer-based strings

  • Use const with pointers and the data they point to

• Pointer problems

  • Powerful but challenging to work with

  • Modern C++ features make most use of pointers obsolete

  • new software development projects

    • use references rather than pointers
    • use std::array and std::vector rather than built in pointer-based arrays
    • used std::string objects to pointer-based c-strings

  • C++ 20 features to avoid pointers

    • to_array converts pointer based array to a more robust std::array
    • spans safer way to pass built in arrays to functions
      • iterable, (so you can use them with range based for)
      • also can use them with standard library container-processing algorithms

    • key takeaway

      • avoid using pointers, pointer-based arrays and pointer based strings when ever possible
        • if you have to use them take advantage of to_array and spans

• When pointers are required

  • Lagacy code

  • dynamic data structures
    • though most programmers will use the c++ standard library’s existing dynamic containers
  • command-line arguments
  • pass arguments by refrence if there’s a possiblilty of a nullptr

Pointer Declarations and initialization

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