Difference Between Data Structures and Pointers

[cbvsastry]

Hi,

I always had a doubt regarding the difference between pointers and data structures... Could anyone give me the clarification...

[vimase]

Hi,

I always had a doubt regarding the difference between pointers and data structures... Could anyone give me the clarification...

Pointers are constructs that point to the address location of a particular data type. Ofcourse, pointers also need to have data types associated with them, i.e. while declaring we have to define the data type of the pointer, for e.g.
int * p;
char * p1;
but the pointer is just pointing to the memory location, which holds the particular variable. So by just changing the reference of the pointer, the same pointer can point to any variable of that particular data type.

[dasarisrikar]

Pointer is a variable which holds the address of another variable.................
int *p; which means...
1)p is a variable which holds the address of integer variable
(or)
2)p is a pointer points to an integer

so pointer hold the address of a variable accordingly.

Data structure:
the organization of data (and its storage allocations in a computer)
in data structure pointers are widly used... as pointers deals vth da memory adress.....we can easily organise data using pointers.

[mohiniu]

pointers are "constructs"...
what are "constructs"?

[mohiniu]

good explanation disarisikar

[Sherin]

DATA STRUCTURE

Structure refers to a collection consisting of elements of heterogenous data type
Structure uses “.” (Dot operator) for element access
Instantiation of Structure objects is possible.
Bit filed is possible in an Structure.
Structure is a user-defined datatype.


ARRAY

Array refers to a collection consisting of elements of homogenous data type.
Array uses subscripts or “[ ]” (square bracket) for element access
Instantiation of Array objects is not possible.
Bit filed is not possible in an Array.
Arrays is a primitive datatype

[Banfa]

Not incorrect @Sherin but the question was difference between a structure and a pointer not a structure and an array.

Note that arrays are not pointers in several very significant ways. Sometimes, because the name of an array variable used alone decomposes to a pointer to the first element of an array people confuse pointers and arrays but it is better not to.

For example using the sizeof operator the sizeof an array is the actual size of all the data in the array so that sizeof array/sizeof array[0] is the number of entries in the array. Size of a pointer is either 4 or 8 or less often now 2 (depending on your platforms pointer size) sizeof pointer/sizeof pointer[0] is meaningless.