Consider the following statements:

int    *pFarr, *pVarr;

int    farr[3] = {11,22,33};
int    varr[3] = {7,8,9};

pFarr = &(farr[0]);
pVarr = varr;

At this stage, both pointers are pointing at the start of each respective array address. For *pFarr, we are presently looking at 11 and for *pVarr, 7.

Equally, if I request the contents of each array through *farr and *varr, i also get 11 and 7.

So far so good.

Now, let's try pFarr++ and pVarr++. Great. We're now looking at 22 and 8, as expected.

But now...

Trying to move up farr++ and varr++ ... and we get "wrong type of argument to increment".

Now, I recognize the difference between an array pointer and a regular pointer, but since their behaviour is similar, why this limitation?

This is further confusing to me when I also consider that in the same program I can call the following function in an ostensibly correct way and in another incorrect way, and I get the same behaviour, though in contrast to what happened in the code posted above!?

working_on_pointers ( pFarr, farr );  // calling with expected parameters
working_on_pointers ( farr, pFarr );  // calling with inverted parameters 

.

void working_on_pointers ( int *pExpect, int aExpect[] ) {

    printf("%i", *pExpect);  // displays the contents of pExpect ok
    printf("%i", *aExpect);  // displays the contents of aExpect ok

    pExpect++;               // no warnings or errors
    aExpect++;               // no warnings or errors

    printf("%i", *pExpect);  // displays the next element or an overflow element (with no errors)
    printf("%i", *aExpect);  // displays the next element or an overflow element (with no errors)

}

Could someone help me to understand why array pointers and pointers behave in similar ways in some contexts, but different in others?

So many thanks.

EDIT: Noobs like myself could further benefit from this resource: http://www.panix.com/~elflord/cpp/gotchas/index.shtml