title: Why is the 'this' keyword not a reference type in C++
body: <blockquote>
    <p><strong>Possible Duplicates:</strong><br>
    <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/645994/why-this-is-a-pointer-and-not-a-reference">Why &lsquo;this&rsquo; is a pointer and not a reference?</a><br>
    <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/320436/safe-pointer-to-a-pointer-well-reference-to-a-reference-in-c">SAFE Pointer to a pointer (well reference to a reference) in C#</a>  </p>
  </blockquote>
  
  
  
  <p>The <code>this</code> keyword in C++ gets a pointer to the object I currently am.</p>
  
  <p>My question is why is the type of <code>this</code> a pointer type and not a reference type.
  Are there any conditions under which the <code>this</code> keyword would be <code>NULL</code>?</p>
  
  <p>My immediate thought would be in a static function, but Visual C++ at least is smart enough to spot this and report <code>static member functions do not have 'this' pointers</code>. Is this in the standard?</p>