[colanderman]

No, the trick is to remember that declaration follows use. Declare a symbol using (nearly) the same exact syntax you would use to extract a value of the base type from that symbol.

See also my comment last time this subject came up: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12775966

[Y_Y]

And yet so many people learn

  int* p; // p is an int pointer

instead of

  int *p; // dereferencing p will give an int

I know this is the subject of holy wars, but once I'd seen the second one my eyes were opened and I had way less trouble. I think that declaration follows use is another of example of the amazing design powers of the patriarchs.

[kevin_thibedeau]

Considering that

    int * foo, bar;

are variables of two different types, the asterisk clearly has affinity to the variable name. It is misleading to bind it to the base type name.

[m_mueller]

how do you remember a const pointer like

> int * const a

? i.e. in what way do you extend your scheme such that it makes sense again?

[loeg]

'a' is a constant that can be dereferenced to get int.

[ci5er]

My brain parses both of your expressions (and both of your comments) the same way.

Like, it's tautological: 'de-referencing an int pointer will give you an int'

Brains are weird.

[Retra]

Mine does too, but that's because I've trained myself to see it that way in order to understand this exact concern.

[TheDong]

> amazing design powers of the patriarchs

Thanks for elevating their gender specifically.... gosh forbid that Ada had any amazing design powers.

[mikekchar]

Not the OP, but given that English is historically gender biased, I find it pretty easy to unconsciously fall into the trap of using a gender biased turn of phrase. Even if one is consciously trying to avoid such things, our messy neural nets being what they are, mistakes happen.

Given the almost certainty (in my mind anyway), that the OP meant no disrespect to people who identify with genders that are not male, it would make me very happy indeed if requests for correction could be made in a respectful way. Simply asking something like "Would you mind using the alternative phrasing 'blah blah blah'" would go a long way towards helping everyone to maintain a civil tone.

[leereeves]

Wasn't C designed by a man?

[ci5er]

A couple of 'em!

[Y_Y]

Thanks for caring about gendered language. I used this term because it's used (humorously) in the Unix Koans[0]. But maybe you're reading to far into it, I certainly don't mean to imply their gender had anything to do with C's design, but for better or worse they did happen to be men and were seen by by some as a "father figure" for the language.

[0]http://catb.org/esr/writings/unix-koans/zealot.html