How to initialize a pointer to a struct in C?

Question

Given this struct:

struct PipeShm {     int init;     int flag;     sem_t *mutex;     char * ptr1;     char * ptr2;     int status1;     int status2;     int semaphoreFlag;  }; 

That works fine:

static struct PipeShm myPipe = { .init = 0 , .flag = FALSE , .mutex = NULL ,          .ptr1 = NULL , .ptr2 = NULL , .status1 = -10 , .status2 = -10 ,          .semaphoreFlag = FALSE }; 

But when I declare static struct PipeShm * myPipe , that doesn't work , I'm assuming that I'd need to initialize with the operator ->, but how?

static struct PipeShm * myPipe = {.init = 0 , .flag = FALSE , .mutex = NULL ,          .ptr1 = NULL , .ptr2 = NULL , .status1 = -10 , .status2 = -10 ,          .semaphoreFlag = FALSE }; 

Is it possible to declare a pointer to a struct and use initialization with it?

Answer 1

You can do it like so:

static struct PipeShm * myPipe = &(struct PipeShm) {     .init = 0,     /* ... */ }; 

This feature is called a "compound literal" and it should work for you since you're already using C99 designated initializers.

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Regarding the storage of compound literals:

6.5.2.5-5

If the compound literal occurs outside the body of a function, the object has static storage duration; otherwise, it has automatic storage duration associated with the enclosing block.