What is C

What is C

C is a general-purpose programming language, and is used for writing programs in many different domains, such as operating systems, numerical computing, graphical applications, etc. It is a small language, with just 32 keywords. It provides “high-level” structuredprogramming constructs such as statement grouping, decision making, and looping, as well as “lowlevel” capabilities such as the ability to manipulate bytes and addresses.

C version history

The origin of C is closely tied to the development of the Unix operating system, originally implemented in assembly language on a PDP-7 by Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson, incorporating several ideas from colleagues. Eventually, they decided to port the operating system to a PDP-11.

Thompson needed a programming language to make utilities. At first, he tried to make a Fortran compiler, but soon gave up the idea and made a new language, B, Thompson’s simplified version of BCPL.

In 1972, Ritchie started to improve B, which resulted in creating a new language C. C compiler and some utilities made by C were included in Version 2 Unix.

At Version 4 Unix released at Nov. 1973, the Unix kernel was extensively re-implemented by C.[10] By this time, the C language had acquired some powerful features such as struct types. Unix was one of the first operating system kernels implemented in a language other than assembly.

Code Example

 #include<stdio.h>
   int main ()
     {
         printf("Hello World");
         return 0;
     }