That said, it's actually an excellent C interview question
This was actually one of the very first questions we used to ask during interviews at Tenable. I'm honestly kind of amazed it's now seen as some sort of tricky technique. I would think (or hope) most C programmers would see it as basic competence with pointers.
I would think (or hope) most C programmers would see it as basic competence with pointers.
Which is exactly what Torvald's was saying. All the comments here going "that's unreadable" or "it's too clever" scare me. And I don't even consider myself some C coding rockstar (took me a bit to sort out my own mental picture of pointers).
"Hope" is more like it. I went to one interview where they asked to traverse a list, and since it was for a senior C position I gave them the * * version. There was this pause and then their lead dev said that this cannot possibly work. It was really awkward.
This was actually one of the very first questions we used to ask during interviews at Tenable. I'm honestly kind of amazed it's now seen as some sort of tricky technique. I would think (or hope) most C programmers would see it as basic competence with pointers.