Question

How can the below code result in a dangling pointer.

{
    char *cPointer = malloc ( some constant number );
    /* some code */
    free ( cPointer );      
    cPointer = NULL;        
    /* some code */
}

Answer 1

It can’t.

This would:

char * a = malloc(556);
char * b = a;
free(a);
a = NULL;

b is now dangling pointer, because the object it pointed to it’s gone but b still stores address to memory where the object used to be, you get funny results when you try to access it – it depends if the memory has been reused or is untouched.