looking for a good pointer info

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Originally Posted by Paul McKenzie

The "&" used in this context is not the reference operator, it is the address-of operator.

Since addresses are pointers, then you are passing by value (the value being the address-of i).

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I doubt olivthill2 wasn't aware of that fact, probably he meant "pass by" as a semantical language indipendent concept; in this sense, pointers implement pass-by-reference semantics in C.

besides, if one think at function calls only in terms of initialization rules of its arguments types, then only pass-by-value exist in C or C++, because you always have a source type that is used to initialize the content of a target a type ( yes, references are not object, being not required to have a storage; nonetheless it makes sense identifying their "value" with a non-null pointer ).

indeed, I think that speaking of "passing X by Y" makes no pedagogical sense in C++, because it's not necessary ( as above, you can always represent the function invokation process as a value-initialization mechanism ) and it's also dangerous because it hides the underlying initialization mechanism ( consider copy-elision or special conversions, like array decay, etc... ).

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Originally Posted by superbonzo

indeed, I think that speaking of "passing X by Y" makes no pedagogical sense in C++,

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I think it's pedagogically best to stick to conventional terminology.

And it's quite a difference whether a language natively supports pass by reference or you must simulate it.

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Originally Posted by laserlight

I think Skizmo is talking about shortcut icons and symlinks;

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Or maybe he's talking about a dog :)

http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/pointer.htm