I''ve been researching this now for a month or so and I''ve read more than enough on the topic to last a lifetime. However one question persists in my little head and it won''t go away, so I find the need to ask. Why use pointers? Basically a pointer does exactly the same job(s) as any other variable will do. Only with a pointer it is more effecient and thus saves valuable time upon execution. However your using a pointer to do just what a variable statement could do, why bring in the additional code and use pointers? As an example you might have a variable definition int Pleb = 10. Then to change this you would do Pleb = Pleb +5. Or you could bring in a pointer and do int *ptrPleb = &Pleb. Now with this you would change the value of the variable Pleb by *ptrPleb = *ptrPleb + 5. My whole point is both do exactly the same job right. So why bother bringing in all the additional code just to do the value modification with a pointer when you can easily do the same job with the variable? Seems both pointless and redundant to moi. Anyone got another angle on this? Thanks, Paul.

Well, as you''ll probably discover sooner or later, there are a few things in programming you simply couldnt do without pointers. Using a pointer for a single integer variable rarely has any major advantages, but when dealing with large dynamic arrays or structures, pointers will come up often.

Say you have an array of integers, representing test scores (to keep it simple) that you need to average. When you write the code, you don''t know how many test scores every teacher who uses the program will have. With a pointer, you can allocate an array with the size of some other previously inputted number...

int *scores;
//get input from user
scores = new int[numScores];

Then later in your code you could even reallocate it to a second size, or simple delete it with the delete keyword.
As you can see, many serious problems could result in only being able to use staticly sized arrays, and pointers give you a powerful control on memory management.

If you want a second example, let''s say you have a struct with several elements in it that represents some kind of a record that needs to be filled based on user input or some other factor that you can only know during run-time. You would ideally create a function to fill the data elements for you, and to do that you''d need to be able to pass the function the structure you need filled. Passing an entire structure may not be a significant performance hit if it''s small in memory size, but when you''re dealing with a struct or class that has ten thousand vertices and surface normals and all that junk in it, then it can really kill your program by having to pass it to a function whenever you want it changed. As an efficient solution, pointers can be used. You can just have the function accept a pointer, which has a very small size in memory, and access the members with -> notation...ex.

player->x = 0;

Well, I hope that helped, and I hope I just didn''t wrap a bunch of crap that would confuse anyone who reads it. But good luck.

Yeah I get it thanks.

Basic pointers are worthless pointers only become like gold dust when used with large arrays, structs or functions. However pointers also only become useful when you start to use the New and Delete keywords. So for simple programs don''t bother with pointers but for more programs using a lot of data use pointers.

Got it, thanks,

Paul.

If you're programming C++, there is almost no non-trivial task that you can do without pointers. They are absolutely essential for most advanced data structures, as well as OOP. Even simple tasks require pointers: can you think of a way to copy memory without them? How about passing arrays back and forth between functions?

It's not just that I 'grew up around them', it's that C++ seems to have been designed/evolved around their use. Other languages have different constructs that do many of the tasks that require pointers in C++.

quote:
So for simple programs don't bother with pointers but for more programs using a lot of data use pointers.

No. Don't 'bother' with pointers at all, regardless of the amount of data. If you don't have to use them, don't. However, you will eventually come across many tasks that actually cannot be done without pointers.

[edited by - micepick on May 29, 2003 11:59:12 AM]

quote:Original post by Village Specialton
Many languages manage to do without them.

It''s important to realise that the generalisation of a pointer is the concept of `level of indirection''. That some languages do not directly provide pointers does not mean they omit this important concept. For example, in languages like Java, Python and Lisp, all variables are conceptually pointers, and so can be used to solve the same problems that involve explicitly specifying pointers in C++. In reality, you are using pointers `under-the-hood'', it''s just that C++ forces you to concentrate on such details whether they are relevant to the problem or not.

quote:
But some people have lived around pointers so much that they can''t live without them. Even though I understand them, I see very little use for them.

As an exercise, try creating your own linked-list without using pointers.

Thanks a lot people, this is the stuff I was after

Basically, dont use them until you feel oyu have to. When you''ve programmed in C++ for a short while, you''ll see why pointers are so damn useful. But when you''re doing tutorials or learning from a book or anything like that, the examples are so simple that there really isn''t any reason to use pointers.

But try doing without pointers for now if that feels more natural. Sooner or later you''ll run into something that makes you see why pointers are useful. Until then? Dont worry too much about them :D

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