On Wed, 30 Jun 2010 23:40:06 -0600, Michael Torrie wrote: > Given "char buf[512]", buf's type is char * according to the compiler > and every C textbook I know of.
No, the type of "buf" is "char [512]", i.e. "array of 512 chars". If you use "buf" as an rvalue (rather than an lvalue), it will be implicitly converted to char*. If you take its address, you'll get a "pointer to array of 512 chars", i.e. a pointer to the array rather than to the first element. Converting this to a char* will yield a pointer to the first element. If buf was declared "char *buf", then taking its address will yield a char**, and converting this to a char* will produce a pointer to the first byte of the pointer, which is unlikely to be useful. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
