Pointer/address type casting

Question

I have the following variables:

char *p;
int l=65;

Why do the following casts fail?

(int *)p=&l;

and:

Answer 1

The correct way to do this would be:

int I = 65;
char* p = (char*)&I;

&I gives you an int* that points to I; you then cast this to a char* and assign it to p.

Note that you shouldn't ordinarily cast between pointers of unrelated types. A char* can be used to access any object, though, so in this particular case it is safe.