If it is an operator, that is referring to the value of a variable storing a specific address, so the content can be read or written. If it is an specifier, that is denoting the date type is a pointer to something, like a pointer to integer, or even a pointer to a pointer. The tricky part is that these two usages both use '*'. As we cannot dereferencing the value when declaring itself, like variables and return types, nor can we change the data type to pointer when dereferencing it, these usages will not have any ambiguity when we use any of them. Just need some time to get used to them.