Error when type casting. Confusion

Question

double d = 43.56;
int m = d;
cout<<(char *)&m<<endl; //works fine, it prints: + = 43
cout<<(char *)m<<endl; //this doesn't work, char can't be made into a  pointer
cout<<reinterpret_cast<char *>(&m)<<endl; //works fine, prints: +
cout<<static_cast<char *>(&m)<<endl; //Does not work

My question is, why the last line of code doesn't work?

Compiler error message: invalid static_cast from int* to type char*

Shouldn't static_cast be able to convert this?

Thanks in advance.

I don't understand. Why doesn't `(char *) m` work? We use it frequently in embedded systems to assign addresses of hardware components to pointers. — Thomas Matthews, Sep 20 '16 at 20:49
You may be confusing casting with the available overloads of `operator<<`. For example `cout` will print a `char *` as a string; but `void *` as a pointer. — Thomas Matthews, Sep 20 '16 at 20:50

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 20 '16 at 20:52

Here is the complete list of what can be done with static_cast. And there is no option to cast pointer to one class to pointer to another non related class. Simply because this is not a standard C++ behavior.
However one can still use the c-style cast, reinterpret_cast or even "casting" with union.

Error when type casting. Confusion

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