Pointers and memory

yes, using the & operator gets the memory address of the variable. so

char alpha = 'a'

char *pointy = α

would make pointy "point" to the memory address of alpha. if you want to print the value of pointy (not the address) you would have to dereference it using the * operator:

//pointy value: a would be printed
printf("pointy value: %c", *pointy);

if you wanted to print the memory address that pointy points to, you would need to use the %p format specifier and just reference the pointer name, without a *

//prints the address pointy points to
printf("pointy value: %p", pointy);

if you declared another pointer variable and wanted to point it at the same address as pointy, you would use

//anotherPointer points to the same address  as pointy
char *anotherPointer = pointy;

since pointy by itself (without the * operator) is a memory address, anotherPointer now points to the same address as your pointy pointer. If you wanted to assign the value that pointy points to to a variable, you would have to dereference it

//since the value at the memory address pointy points to is 'a', someChar now has a value of 'a'
char someChar = *pointy;

TLDR; *pointy references the value thats at the memory address the pointer points to, pointy references the memory address that pointy points to, &alpha references the memory address of the variable alpha.