the.com/pointer
A finger made of code, gesturing at where the good stuff lives.
means A variable that stores the memory address of another value rather than the value itself, letting code refer to data by where it lives instead of carrying it around.
from From the verb 'point,' which came through Old French 'pointe' from Latin 'pungere,' to prick or pierce — the same root that gives us 'puncture' and 'pungent.' A pointer is literally a thing that points, the agent-noun built with '-er.' The breed of dog that freezes and aims its nose at game wears the same name, and computing simply borrowed the everyday gesture: a value whose whole job is to indicate 'over there.'
- null danger
- Tony Hoare called null his billion-dollar mistake
- hardware proof
- the mouse cursor is the world's most-used pointer
- dog origin
- the breed freezes mid-stride pointing at prey
- speed trick
- pointers pass huge data without copying it
- dangling peril
- pointing at freed memory crashes programs spectacularly
pointer sisters — american pop/soul group formed in 1969, had multiple grammy awards and #1 hits
english pointer — dog breed from england, bred for hunting and pointing at game birds