Question

What are the official names for the operators * and & in the context of pointers? They seem to be frequently called dereference operator and address-of operator respectively, but unfortunately, the section on unary operators in the standard does not name them.

I really don’t want to name & address-of anymore, because & returns a pointer, not an address. (see below) The standard is very clear about this:

The result of the unary & operator is a pointer to its operand.

Symmetry suggests to name & reference operator which is a little unfortunate because of the collision with references in C++. The fact that & returns a pointer suggests pointer operator. Are there any official sources that would confirm these (or other) namings?

pointers vs. addresses

A pointer is a language mechanism, while an address is an implementation detail. Addresses are untyped, while pointers aren’t, except for void*. Kevlin Henney also distinguishes between pointers and addresses in an Interview:

C […] allows us to abstract the specifics of the machine to the point that we are talking about pointers and not addresses. There is a whole load of pain that you no longer have to go through.

Answer 1

From the C99 draft, at the index:

* (indirection operator), 6.5.2.1, 6.5.3.2

& (address operator), 6.3.2.1, 6.5.3.2

From the C++0x draft, at the index:

*, see indirection operator, see multiplication operator

&, see address-of operator, see bitwise AND operator

It’s also referenced in 9.6/3 “The address-of operator & shall not be applied to a bit-field, so there are no pointers to bit-fields.”

(So, sorry, you still need to call & “address-of” :p)

Personally I don’t care the actual name as long as other can understand what I’m saying. I just call * “star” and & “and”. 🙂