C# Language Specification

Pointer member access

A pointer-member-access consists of a primary-expression, followed by a “->” token, followed by an identifier and an optional type-argument-list.

pointer-member-access:
primary-expression -> identifier type-argument-list_opt

In a pointer member access of the form P->I, P must be an expression of a pointer type other than void*, and I must denote an accessible member of the type to which P points.

A pointer member access of the form P->I is evaluated exactly as (*P).I. For a description of the pointer indirection operator (*), see §18.5.1. For a description of the member access operator (.), see §7.6.4.

In the example

using System;

struct Point

{
public int x;
public int y;

public override string ToString() {

return "(" + x + "," + y + ")";
}
}

class Test

{
static void Main() {
Point point;
unsafe {
Point* p = &point;
p->x = 10;
p->y = 20;
Console.WriteLine(p->ToString());
}
}
}

the -> operator is used to access fields and invoke a method of a struct through a pointer. Because the operation P->I is precisely equivalent to (*P).I, the Main method could equally well have been written:

class Test
{
static void Main() {
Point point;
unsafe {
Point* p = &point;
(*p).x = 10;
(*p).y = 20;
Console.WriteLine((*p).ToString());
}
}
}

3.