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Re: pointers

From BartC <bc@freeuk.com>
Newsgroups comp.lang.c
Subject Re: pointers
Date 2016-10-25 16:54 +0100
Organization A noiseless patient Spider
Message-ID <nunv6s$vff$1@dont-email.me> (permalink)
References (7 earlier) <lnpompbvcj.fsf@kst-u.example.com> <nulcl7$sr1$1@dont-email.me> <lneg35bsfq.fsf@kst-u.example.com> <nulfjf$qgb$1@dont-email.me> <87y41d32o2.fsf@bsb.me.uk>

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On 24/10/2016 21:36, Ben Bacarisse wrote:
> BartC <bc@freeuk.com> writes:

>> But you can't have **pointer as an rvalue that can have & & in front
>> to yield the equivalent of pointer? That is, with the first & yielding
>> *pointer, and the second 'pointer'.
>
> Yup.
>
> Could have been defined otherwise.  One option that might have satisfied
> you is simply to extend the "& cancels * or []" rules to more levels.

I'm sure not that would have been necessary. Once any &* cancel out, the 
two disappear out of existence, turning '& &* *pointer' into '&*pointer' 
and then you start again, ending up with 'pointer'.

& is different from other operators that apply some function to their 
operands; the purpose of & is to /stop/ a function being applied! (A 
dereference), so neither & nor * applied to the same term can be 
considered in isolation. So in this example:

   int a;

   &*a;

the &* ought to cancel leaving just the legal 'a;'. But instead an error 
is reported about being unable to apply * to a. Presumably this check is 
done before it realises that * is eliminated by the & so that the * 
would never be applied anyway.

> That makes the rule fussy

The rule can be very simple: any adjacent &* or *& just disappear. But 
applied recursively. You should end up with 0 or 1 & (see below), or 0 
or more *.

  for very little gain since the need for
> expressions of the form & &**p must be insignificant.  The second option
> would have been to say that the result of & is an lvalue.  The trouble
> with that is what object will it designate?  In the case of & &**p there
> is an obvious choice, but not in & &i where i is declared int, say.

There is one deref associated with i (where its address is used to fetch 
its value), so two & in front would be an error.

The net number of & or * must be compatible with the type of the 
expression they are applied to. But I can't see a net number of two or 
more & being compatible with any type. So & & must be followed in the 
source by at least one *.

-- 
Bartc

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Thread

pointers asetofsymbols@gmail.com - 2016-10-23 08:11 -0700
  Re: pointers Richard Heathfield <rjh@cpax.org.uk> - 2016-10-23 16:26 +0100
    Re: pointers asetofsymbols@gmail.com - 2016-10-23 10:35 -0700
      Re: pointers Ike Naar <ike@iceland.freeshell.org> - 2016-10-23 17:47 +0000
        Re: pointers asetofsymbols@gmail.com - 2016-10-25 12:55 -0700
      Re: pointers "James R. Kuyper" <jameskuyper@verizon.net> - 2016-10-23 13:58 -0400
        Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-24 00:55 +0100
          Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-23 17:27 -0700
            Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-24 11:53 +0100
              Re: pointers supercat@casperkitty.com - 2016-10-24 07:29 -0700
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-24 08:55 -0700
                Re: pointers Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu> - 2016-10-24 14:02 -0700
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-24 14:42 -0700
                Re: pointers Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu> - 2016-10-25 08:56 -0700
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-25 12:17 -0700
                Re: pointers Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu> - 2016-10-26 06:37 -0700
              Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-24 08:49 -0700
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-24 17:25 +0100
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-24 09:52 -0700
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-24 18:15 +0100
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-24 12:20 -0700
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-24 20:58 +0100
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-24 13:16 -0700
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-24 23:53 +0100
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-25 13:38 -0700
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-25 23:06 +0100
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-25 15:39 -0700
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-26 00:26 +0100
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-25 16:44 -0700
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-26 01:02 +0100
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-25 17:35 -0700
                Re: pointers Ike Naar <ike@iceland.freeshell.org> - 2016-10-26 06:27 +0000
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-26 12:47 +0100
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-26 09:05 -0700
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-26 18:46 +0100
                Re: pointers supercat@casperkitty.com - 2016-10-26 11:44 -0700
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-26 20:12 +0100
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-26 20:30 +0100
                Re: pointers supercat@casperkitty.com - 2016-10-26 13:02 -0700
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-26 11:52 -0700
                Re: pointers Ike Naar <ike@iceland.freeshell.org> - 2016-10-26 19:11 +0000
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-26 21:25 +0100
                Re: pointers "James R. Kuyper" <jameskuyper@verizon.net> - 2016-10-25 18:56 -0400
                Re: pointers "James R. Kuyper" <jameskuyper@verizon.net> - 2016-10-25 19:12 -0400
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-25 16:31 -0700
                Re: pointers Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> - 2016-10-24 21:36 +0100
                Re: pointers BartC <bc@freeuk.com> - 2016-10-25 16:54 +0100
                Re: pointers Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> - 2016-10-25 19:09 +0100
                Re: pointers supercat@casperkitty.com - 2016-10-24 11:33 -0700
                Re: pointers Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2016-10-24 12:22 -0700
          Re: pointers James Kuyper <jameskuyper@verizon.net> - 2016-10-24 10:23 -0400
  Re: pointers "James R. Kuyper" <jameskuyper@verizon.net> - 2016-10-23 12:31 -0400
    Re: pointers Richard Heathfield <rjh@cpax.org.uk> - 2016-10-23 17:38 +0100
  Re: pointers Lorinczy Zsigmond <zsiga@nospam.for.me> - 2016-10-24 14:02 +0200
  Re: pointers John Bode <jfbode1029@gmail.com> - 2016-10-24 13:34 -0700

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