Pointers in C++

versatility: the ability to do many different things

In C++, nullptr is a special keyword introduced in C++11 to represent a null pointer in a type-safe way.

To dereference a pointer means to access or manipulate the value stored at the memory address the pointer is pointing to. In C++, you use the asterisk * operator to do this.

precede: to happen before something or come before something/somebody in order

int *ptr; is a declaration of a pointer to an integer in C++.

- int is the type of data the pointer will point to.

- * indicates that ptr is a pointer.

- ptr is the name of the variable.

ptr = &a;  // ptr now holds the memory address of a

colloquially: in a way that is used in conversation but not in formal speech or writing

ptr is a pointer, which means it is a special type of variable designed to store memory addresses. When you assign &a to ptr (using the address-of operator &), you are storing the memory address of the variable a in ptr. This allows ptr to "point" to a, meaning ptr now holds the location in memory where a is stored. This is why ptr can be referred to the address of a.

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