CS208 Introduction to Computer Systems
Wednesday, 15 April 2026

+ Questions

+ Upcoming pointer/memory topics
- memory layout; where is everything?
- why use pointers?
- dynamic memory allocation (malloc) and deallocation (free)
- basic pointer syntax
    - * in declarations
    - * as unary operator ("dereference" operator)
    - & as unary operator ("address of" operator)
- arrays and pointers
    - char *a = "dog" vs. char a[4] = "dog"
- structs
    - what are they
    - try a linked list

+ memory layout for any running program
- OS
- Program Code
- Global read-only memory: string literals, etc.
- Heap
- Stack

+ the value of asdf.c

+ Lab

+ arrays are weird
- char *s = "cow";
- char t[10] = "pig";

+ pointers.c walkthrough

+ memory.c walkthrough