Arrays of pointers (to strings)
Array of pointers is an array whose elements are pointers to the base address of the string.
It is declared and initialized as follows −
char *a[3 ] = {"one", "two", "three"};
//Here, a[0] is a ptr to the base add of the string "one"
//a[1] is a ptr to the base add of the string "two"
//a[2] is a ptr to the base add of the string "three"Advantages
Unlink the two-dimensional array of characters. In (array of strings), in array of pointers to strings there is no fixed memory size for storage.
The strings occupy as many bytes as required hence, there is no wastage of space.
Example 1
#include<stdio.h>
main (){
char *a[5] = {“one”, “two”, “three”, “four”, “five”};//declaring array of pointers to
string at compile time
int i;
printf ( “The strings are:”)
for (i=0; i<5; i++)
printf (“%s”, a[i]); //printing array of strings
getch ();
}Output
The strings are: one two three four five
Example 2
Consider another example on array of pointers for strings −
#include <stdio.h>
#include <String.h>
int main(){
//initializing the pointer string array
char *students[]={"bhanu","ramu","hari","pinky",};
int i,j,a;
printf("The names of students are:\n");
for(i=0 ;i<4 ;i++ )
printf("%s\n",students[i]);
return 0;
}Output
The names of students are: bhanu ramu hari pinky