Pointers and addresses
There are two ways of declaring an object variable: either as an instance of the object or a pointer to an instance of the object. In the former case the variable holds the object and the object is created (“instantiated”) at the same time. In the latter case the variable only has space to hold the address of the object. It takes another step to create the object instance using the new operator and assign its address to the variable.
Creating object instances
There are several ways of creating object instances in C++. These ways differ in how the object should be referenced and deleted. This table shows the rules.
Pointers vs References
In the first group of statements (1) a Joystick object is created as a reference - stick1 refers to the object itself. In the second group of statements, stick2 is a pointer to a Joystick object.
ArcadeDrive()in WPILib takes advantage of a C++ feature called function overloading. This allows it to have two methods with the same name that differ by argument lists. The one ArcadeDrive(Joystick &j) takes the parameter j as a reference to a Joystick instance. You supply a Joystick and the compiler automatically passes a reference to that instance. The other ArcadeDrive(Joystick *j) takes the parameter j as a pointer to a Joystick instance. You supply a pointer to a Joystick instance. The cool thing is that the compiler figures out which ArcadeDrive to call. The library is built this way to support both the pointer style and the reference style.
If you had non-overloaded functions Ref(Joystick &j) and Ptr(Joystick *j), you could still call them if you use the right C++ operators: Ref(*stick2) and Ptr(&stick1). At run time, references and pointers are both passed as addresses to the instance. The difference is the source code syntax and details like allocation and deletion.
