Answer
A dangling pointer holds a value that no longer designates a live object. • It can arise after free or after an automatic object’s lifetime ends. • Reading or writing through it has undefined behavior. • Setting one pointer to NULL does not repair other aliases to the expired object.
💡 C Example
int *pointer = malloc(sizeof *pointer);
if (pointer != NULL) {
free(pointer);
pointer = NULL;
}
⚡ Quick Revision
A dangling pointer refers to an object whose lifetime has ended.