Editing C syntax (section)

====Dereferencing====
The pointed-to data can be accessed through a pointer value. In the following example, the integer variable ''b'' is set to the value of integer variable ''a'', which is 10:

<syntaxhighlight lang=C>
int a=10;
int *p;
p = &a;
int b = *p;
</syntaxhighlight>

In order to accomplish that task, the unary [[dereference operator]], denoted by an asterisk (*), is used. It returns the data to which its operand—which must be of pointer type—points. Thus, the expression *''p'' denotes the same value as ''a''. Dereferencing a [[null pointer]] is illegal.