Pointer declarations in Objective C

When reading various texts or code examples on Obj-C I see pointer declarations like this:

NSString *myStringPtr

but sometimes I see,

NS开发者_运维知识库String * myStringPtr

where there is a space between the name and the *.

Is there a difference between these declarations or are they both just pointers to an object of type NSString or am I missing something?

In general is the space between the * and name necessary?

I have even seen NSString* myStringPtr

Is this any different than the above statements?

I realize (NSString *) for method return types or arguments means the method is returning (or being passed) a pointer to an NSString object.

No, the asterisk can be attached to either the name or the type, or in between (with spaces as padding). It makes no difference. However, Objective-C most commonly uses the style

NSString *myStr;

rather than

NSString * myStr;

or

NSString* myStr;

The placement of the pointer does make a difference if you declare multiple variables one one line. For example, this

int* a, b;

is functionally identical to this:

int *a;
int  b;    /* Note: This is not a pointer! */

^{(Note: This also applies to C, as this is technically a C syntax issue and not specific to Objective-C.)}