Basics of ‘C’

NIT JALANDHAR
low level or high level?

 A low level language is machine dependent

 High level language is computer independent
and translated into computer understandable
code by a compiler
Some Languages by
Paradigm
 Imperative (also called Structured or
Procedural) Programming
 FORTRAN, BASIC, COBOL, Pascal, C
 Object-Oriented Programming
 SmallTalk, C++, Java
 Functional Programming
 LISP, ML, Haskell
History of Languages

 1950s to 1960s
 FORTRAN, COBOL, LISP, BASIC
 1960s to 1970s
 (ALGOL-based) Pascal and others
 1970s to 1980s
 Prolog, C, Ada
 1980s to 1990s
 C++, ML, Perl, Java
Paradigm Change

 Forexample, from Procedural to Object-

Oriented Programming
 Arises
from problems encountered in one
paradigm but addressed in another
 Case study: from C to C++
 Evolution from procedural, to modular, to
object-based, to object-oriented programming
BASIC C CODE

 #include<stdio.h>
 int main()
 {
 printf(“Hello World”);
 return 0;
 }
THE PROCESS OF
COMPILATION
PREPROCESSING

 Remove comments from code

 Include header files in the code
 Substitute values of macros
Compilation

 Compiler generates assembly code

 Assembler converts generated code into binary
code or machine language
 This is also known as object code
LINKER

 Merge all object codes into single one

 In case we are using any library functions,
linker will link our code with those libraries
 Can be static or dynamic
 Generates .exe file
General Aspect of ‘C’

• C WAS ORIGINALLY DEVELOPED IN THE 1970S, BY

DENNIS RITCHIE AT BELL TELEPHONE
LABORATORIES, INC.
• C IS A HIGH LEVEL , GENERAL –PURPOSE
STRUCTURED PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE.
• INSTRUCTIONS OF C CONSISTS OF TERMS THAT
ARE VERY CLOSELY SAME TO ALGEBRAIC
EXPRESSIONS, CONSISTING OF CERTAIN ENGLISH
KEYWORDS SUCH AS IF, ELSE, FOR ,DO AND
WHILE
The Character set of ‘C’
• C LANGUAGE CONSIST OF SOME CHARACTERS
SET, NUMBERS AND
• SOME SPECIAL SYMBOLS. THE CHARACTER SET
OF C CONSIST OF ALL THE ALPHABETS OF
ENGLISH LANGUAGE.
• SPECIAL SYMBOLS {,},[,],?,+,-,*,/,%,!,;,AND
MORE
• 1) IDENTIFIERS 2)KEYWORDS
3)CONSTANTS
• 4) OPERATORS 5)PUNCTUATION SYMBOLS
Identifiers
 A 'C' program consist of two types of elements ,
user defined and system defined. Idetifiers is
nothing but a name given to these elements.
 An identifier is a word used by a programmer to
name a variable , function, or label.
 identifiers consist of letters and digits, in any
order, except that the first character or lable.
 Identifiers consist of letters and digits if any
order,except that the first character must be
letter.
 Both Upper and lowercase letters can be used
Keywords
 Keywords are nothing but auto double int struct
system defined identifiers.
 break else long switch
Keywords are reserved
words of the language.
case enum register typedef
 They have specific
meaning in the language char extern return union
and cannot be used by the
programmer as variable or const float short unsigned
constant names
 C is case senitive, it means continue for signed void
these must be used as it is
default goto sizeof volatile
 32 Keywords in C
Programming
do if static while
Variables
 A variable is nothing but a name given to a storage area that our
programs can manipulate. Each variable in C has a specific type,
which determines the size and layout of the variable's memory;
the range of values that can be stored within that memory; and
the set of operations that can be applied to the variable.
 The name of a variable can be composed of letters, digits, and the
underscore character. It must begin with either a letter or an
underscore. Upper and lowercase letters are distinct because C is
case-sensitive. There are following basic variable types −
Type Description
 char Typically a single octet(one byte). This is an
integer type.
 int The most natural size of integer for the machine.
 float A single-precision floating point value.
 double A double-precision floating point value.
 void Represents the absence of type.
Constants

 A constant is a value or an identifier whose value

cannot be altered in a program. For example: 1, 2.5,
 As mentioned, an identifier also can be defined as a
constant. eg. const double PI = 3.14
 Here, PI is a constant. Basically what it means is that,
PI and 3.14 is same for this program.

Integer constants
 A integer constant is a numeric constant (associated
with number) without any fractional or exponential
part. There are three types of integer constants in C
programming:

 decimal constant(base 10)

 octal constant(base 8)
 hexadecimal constant(base 16)
Constants

Floating-point constants
 A floating point constant is a numeric constant
that has either a fractional form or an exponent
form. For example: 2.0,0.0000234,-0.22E-5

Character constants
 A character constant is a constant which uses
single quotation around characters. For example:
'a', 'l', 'm', 'F'

String constants
 String constants are the constants which are
enclosed in a pair of double-quote marks. For
example: "good" ,"x","Earth is round\n"
Escape Sequences
Sometimes, it is necessary to use characters which cannot be typed or
has special meaning in C programming. For example: newline(enter),
tab, question mark etc. In order to use these characters, escape
sequence is used.
 For example: \n is used for newline. The backslash ( \ ) causes
"escape" from the normal way the characters are interpreted by the
[Link]
Sequences Character
 \b Backspace
 \f Form feed
 \n Newline
 \r Return
 \t Horizontal tab
 \v Vertical tab
 \\ Backslash
 \' Single quotation mark
 \" Double quotation mark
 \? Question mark
 \0 Null character
Operators in C:An operator is a symbol which
operates on a value or a variable. For example: + is an operator to
perform addition.

C programming has wide range of operators to

perform various operations. For better
understanding of operators, these operators can
be classified as:
 Arithmetic Operators
 Increment and Decrement Operators
 Assignment Operators
 Relational Operators
 Logical Operators
 Conditional Operators
 Bitwise Operators
 Special Operators
Arithmetic Operator

 Operator Meaning of Operator

 + addition or unary plus
 - subtraction or unary minus
 * multiplication
 / division
 % remainder after
division( modulo division)
Increment and Decrement
Operators

1. C programming has two operators

increment ++ and decrement -- to
change the value of an operand
(constant or variable) by 1.
2. Increment ++ increases the value by
1 whereas decrement -- decreases the
value by 1.
3. These two operators are unary
operators, meaning they only operate
on a single operand.
eg. int a=10, b=100
++a = 11
--b = 99
C Assignment Operators
 An assignment operator is used for
assigning a value to a variable. The most
common assignment operator is =
 Operator Example Same as
= a=b a=b
 += a += b a = a+b
 -= a -= b a = a-b
 *= a *= b a = a*b
 /= a /= b a = a/b
 %= a %= b a = a%b
C Relational Operators
 A relational operator checks the relationship
between two operands. If the relation is true, it
returns 1; if the relation is false, it returns value
0.
 Relational operators are used in decision making
and loops.
Operator Meaning of Operator Example
 == Equal to 5 == 3 returns 0
 > Greater than 5 > 3 returns 1
 < Less than 5 < 3 returns 0
 != Not equal to 5 != 3 returns 1
 >= Greater than or equal to 5 >= 3
returns 1
 <= Less than or equal to 5 <= 3 return 0