title: What does a dot before the variable name in struct mean?
body: <p>looking at the linux kernel source, I found this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>static struct tty_operations serial_ops = {
    .open = tiny_open,
    .close = tiny_close,
    .write = tiny_write,
    .write_room = tiny_write_room,
    .set_termios = tiny_set_termios,
  };
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I've never seen such a notation in C.
  Why is there a dot before the variable name?</p>