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NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 25 Jun 2011 03:39:22 -0500
From: Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: References in C
References: <iu1iku$4k9$1@speranza.aioe.org> <lnzkl7c7bm.fsf@nuthaus.mib.org> <iu2t65$pm7$1@dont-email.me> <lnr56idifs.fsf@nuthaus.mib.org>
Date: Sat, 25 Jun 2011 09:39:48 +0100
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Xref: x330-a1.tempe.blueboxinc.net comp.lang.c:6916

Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> writes:

> foo(NULL);
>
> I should have been clearer that "the same thing" refers to some object.

Quite - "doesn't point to nothing" is the best thing about C++-style
references.[0] (Of course, there's still the possibility of "points to
thing that no longer exists", but that's a lot less common source of
bugs, in my experience).  

Of course, the other best thing[1] is "won't end up doing a very deep
copy", but that's less of a problem in C.

[0] why is pass-by-reference sometimes better than pass-by-pointer?
[1] why is pass-by-reference sometimes better than pass-by-value?