C++ pointers

Hello /prog/ i normally program in java but i'm slowly moving to C++. Now on the topic of pointers can anyone give me some details?

http://code.google.com/p/openassist/downloads/detail?name=C%2B%2B%20Standard%20-%20ANSI%20ISO%20IEC%2014882%202003.pdf

It's just a slang term for the ^ operator (exponent) because it looks "pointy."  C++ supports it and Java doesn't.  No biggie.

C'mon guys, all I want is some pointers.

guys is it worth it to make 3D arrays in C++/C or should i just make a 1D array and pack it with all of the information and then use an indexer to find the information @ xyz?

>>5
Use a hashtable (std::map). They have guaranteed O(1) access and so they're very fast.

A pointer is just a address, you can dereference it and reference the value at that address.
The value has a type and so the pointer must be the same type(if you want the same value, you can for example get the char portion of and int var).

>>6
Not nearly as fast as a 3 dimensional array backed by a simple vector. However, even if hashtables are overkill for this, they're not that much worse than 3D arrays. It really depends on what kind of array it is and what you want to use it for.

amortized O(1) access