What is this NSErrorPointer type?

Question

1. In Swift the ampersand sign & is for inout parameters. Like

   var value = 3

   func inoutfunc(inout onlyPara: Int) {

   onlyPara++

   }

   inoutfunc(&value) // value is now 4

   That doesn't look like onlyPara is a pointer, maybe it is and get dereferences immediately when using it inside the function. Is onlyPara a pointer?

2. When I don't need a IntPointer type, why are the framework methods using a NSErrorPointer type? Because they can't change the methods because of existing Objective-C code?

3. But why is then Swift converting &error to NSErrorPointer, is that autoboxed?

   var errorPtr: NSErrorPointer = &error

4. And when I have a NSErrorPointer. How do I dereference it?

   var error: NSError = *errorPtr // won't work

---

Maybe someone can enlighten me. Using only Swift is easy. I think the questions are one chunk of knowledge over & between swift and Objective-C (as the address of operator)

Answer 1

Solution to 4. I found out how to dereference it:

var error: NSError = errorPtr.memory!