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Call-by-reference

An argument passing convention where the address of an argument variable is passed to a function or procedure, as opposed to where the value of the argument expression is passed.

Execution of the function or procedure may have side-effects on the actual argument as seen by the caller. The C language's "&" (address of) and "*" (dereference) operators allow the programmer to code explicit call-by-reference.

Other languages provide special syntax to declare reference arguments (e.g. ALGOL 60).

See also call-by-name, call-by-value, call-by-value-result.

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Calico California State University San Marcos callback call-by-name call-by-need	Application Program Interface call-by-reference call-by-value-result	call-by-value call-by-value-result call/cc callee Caller ID