C++ Array of Pointers

C++ Pointers

Before we explain the concept of pointer arrays, let's first look at an example that uses an array composed of 3 integers:

Example

#include <iostream> using namespace std; const int MAX = 3; int main () { int var[MAX] = {10, 100, 200}; for (int i = 0; i < MAX; i++) { cout << "Value of var[" << i << "] = "; cout << var[i] << endl; } return 0; }

When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following results:

Value of var[0] = 10
Value of var[1] = 100
Value of var[2] = 200

There may be a situation where we want an array to store pointers to int or char or other data types. Below is a declaration of an array of pointers to integers:

int *ptr[MAX];

Here,ptrIt is declared as an array consisting of MAX integer pointers. Therefore, each element in ptr is a pointer to an int value. The following example uses three integers, which will be stored in an array of pointers, as shown below:

Example

#include <iostream> using namespace std; const int MAX = 3; int main () { int var[MAX] = {10, 100, 200}; int *ptr[MAX]; for (int i = 0; i < MAX; i++) { ptr[i] = &var[i]; // assign the address of an integer } for (int i = 0; i < MAX; i++) { cout << "Value of var[" << i << "] = "; cout << *ptr[i] << endl; } return 0; }

When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following results:

Value of var[0] = 10
Value of var[1] = 100
Value of var[2] = 200

You can also use an array of pointers to characters to store a list of strings, as follows:

Example

#include <iostream> using namespace std; const int MAX = 4; int main () { const char *names[MAX] = { "Zara Ali", "Hina Ali", "Nuha Ali", "Sara Ali", }; for (int i = 0; i < MAX; i++) { cout << "Value of names[" << i << "] = "; cout << names[i] << endl; } return 0; }

When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following results:

Value of names[0] = Zara Ali
Value of names[1] = Hina Ali
Value of names[2] = Nuha Ali
Value of names[3] = Sara Ali

C++ Pointers

other extensions