C Char pointers

Question

Let us say we have a array of pointers:

char *ptr[30];

Now this works fine, and doesn\'t seems to do anything unexpected! I can input names easi

Answer 1

The pointer cannot be used that way. It might "work" for you sometimes by sheer chance, but using a pointer without allocating memory for it will cause undefined behavior - meaning that your program may behave erratically and give you unexpected results.

Remember, just because your program compiles and runs doesn't mean it is correct. In the C language there is a whole class of errors known as "undefined behavior", many of which the compiler will happily let you do without complaining. These include overwriting a buffer, using an uninitialized variable, or dereferencing a pointer that doesn't point to a legitimately allocated memory block. Programs that exhibit undefined behavior may even appear to work normally sometimes - but they are usually very unstable and prone to crash.