Pointers

A pointer holds the memory address of a value.

Declaration

var p *int         // *T means a pointer to a T value

i := 2
p = &i             // & operator generates a pointer to its operand

fmt.Println(*p)    // * operatos is used for dereferencing
*p = 21

There is no pointer arithmetic in Go, unlike C.

Example

package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
    i, j := 18, 7799
    
    p := &i            // pointer to i
    fmt.Println(*p)    // read i from the pointer
    
    *p = 19            // change i from the pointer
    fmt.Println(i)
    
    p = &j             // re-assign the pointer to j
    *p = *p / 7
    fmt.Println(j)
}

18
19
1114