Asterisk in parenthesis in Objective-C... What does it mean?

Question

Just a quick question from an Objective-C beginner: what does the asterisk in the parenthesis mean in the following sample code? Is it a pointer? Thanks in advance.

#import <Foundation/Foundation.h>

@interface Tire : NSObject
@end
@implementation Tire

- (NSString *) description
{
   return (@"I am a tire.");
}

@end

Answer 1

You are correct. The * means that description returns a pointer to an NSString object.