The C Language

 

Dennis Ritchie from Bell Laboratories created C, within the early 1970s. C was initially used on a system with UNIX OS . C was derived from a development process, of an older language BCPL, developed by Martin Richards. BCPL was evolved into a language B, written by Ken Thompson, which was the originator of C.

 

While, BCPL and B don't support data-types (they are typless), C provides a spread of data types. the most data- types are characters, integers and floating-point numbers.

 

C is closely related to the UNIX system yet C is not tied to any one Operating system or machine. C has been effectively wont to write programs in different domains.

 

C was used for systems programming. A systems program is associated with the operating system of the computer or its support utilities. Operating Systems, Interpreters, Editors, Assembly programs are usually called systems programs. Unix OS was developed using C. C is now getting used by many programmers for kinds of tasks because of its portability and efficiency. C compilers are available for nearly all computers. Codes written in C on a 1 machine can be compiled and run on another machine by making a few or no changes. C compiler produces fast and error-free object code.

C also offers the speed of an programming language . Programmers can create and maintain library of functions, which may reused by other programs. Thus large projects are often managed easily, with minimum efforts.

 

 

C- A middle Level Language

 

C is thought of as a middle-level  language because it combines elements of high-level languages and  functionalities of an assembly (low-level) language. C  allows manipulation the basic elements of a Computer I.e. bits, bytes, addresses etc. Also, C code is very portable, that is, software written on one type of computer can work on another type of computer. Although C has five basic built-in data types, it is not strongly typed language as compared to high-level languages. C allows data type conversions. It allows direct manipulation of bits, bytes, words, and pointers. Thus, it is used for system-level programming.

 

 

C- A Structured Language

 

The term block-structured language doesn't apply to C. A block-structured language permits procedures and functions to be declared inside another procedure or function. C doesn't allow creation of functions within functions so it’s not a block-structured language. However, it's referred to as a structured language because it is similar in many ways to other structured languages like ALGOL, Pascal and therefore the likes.

 

C allows synthesis of code and data. this is often a distinguishing feature of any structured language. It refers to the power of a language to collect and hide all information and instructions, necessary to perform a selected task, from the remainder of the program. This will be done using functions or code blocks. Functions are wont to define and separate, tasks required during a program.  This enables programs act as a unit. Code block may be a logically connected group of program statements that is treated like a unit.

 

A code block is created by placing a sequence of statements between opening and closing curly braces as shown below