What does "dereferencing" a pointer mean in C/C++?

Dereference is used to access or manipulate the data contained in the memory location pointed to by the pointer. * (asterisk) is used with pointer variables, when dereferencing a pointer variable, it refers to the variable being pointed to, so this is called dereferencing of the pointer.

int main() {
   int a = 7, b ;
   int *p; // Un-initialized Pointer
   p = &a; // Stores address of a in ptr
   b = *p; // Put Value at ptr in b
}

Here, the address in p is basically the address of the variable.

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