Newby Question

[LiteIce]

Hey guys, i've just started c++ and was wondering if one of you guys could tell me what does the -> mean in plain simple English?

e.g.

Im studying DirectX 9.0 and see the following:

D3DSURFACE DESC surfaceDesc;
surface ->GetDesc(&surfaceDesc);

Thanks in advance!

[Elysia]

CString* p = new CString;
*p = "this is a string";
int length = (*p).GetLength();
length = p->GetLength();

The last two does the same thing. -> is usually used to access member functions on a pointer. You can read up a little about pointers since DX9 is full of them.

[LiteIce]

Ty, makes sense

[DougDbug]

Hey guys, i've just started c++... Im studying DirectX 9.0...

DirectX is NOT for beginners!.

I haven't fooled-around with DirectX that much, so I don't know exactly what the prerequisites are. Most of these advanced/special libraries require a very good understanding of variable types (and typedefs), functions, pointers, and structures. Besides that, you won't be able to do anything useful with these DirectX functions if you don't know some standard C++ too.

From your example code, it looks like you need to understand classes/objects too. And, I assume you need know some Windows programming (another advanced topic).... I assume you need to make a GUI Window before doing anything with DirectX graphics.