Let us begin with a quick introduction to C. Our aim is to show the essential elements of the language in real programs, but without getting bogged down in details, formal rules, and exceptions. At this point, we are not trying to be complete or even precise (save that the examples are meant to be correct). We want to get you as quickly as possible to the point where you can write useful programs, and to do that we have to concentrate on the basics: variables, and constants, arithmetic, control flow, functions, and the rudiments of input and output. We are quite intentionally leaving out of this chapter features of C which are of vital importance for writing bigger programs. These include pointers, structures, most of C's rich set of operators, several control flow statements, and myriad details.
This approach has its drawbacks, of course. Most notable is that the complete story on any particular language feature is not found in a single place, and the tutorial, by being brief, may also mislead. And because they can not use the full power of C, the examples are not as concise and elegant as they might be. We have tried to minimize these effects, but be warned.
Another drawback is that later chapters will necessarily repeat some of this chapter. We hope that the repetition will help you more than it annoys.
In any case, experienced programmers should be able to extrapolate from the material in this chapter to their own programming needs. Beginners should supplement it by writing small, similar programs of their own. Both groups can use it as a framework on which to hang the more detailed descriptions that begin in Chapter 2.
Chapter 2: Types, operators and expressions
Variables and constants are the basic data objects manipulated in a program. Declarations list the variables to be used, and state what type they have and perhaps what their initial values are. Operators specify what is to be done to them. Expressions combine variables and constants to produce new values. These are the topics of this chapter.
Chapter 3: Control flow
The control flow statements of a language specify the order in which computations are done. We have already met the most common control flow constructions of C in earlier examples, here we will complete the set, and be more precise about the ones discussed before.
Chapter 4: Functions and program structure
Functions break large computing tasks into smaller ones, and enable people to build on what others have done instead of starting over from scratch. Appropriate functions can often hide details of operation from parts of the program that don't need to know about them, thus clarifying the whole, and easing the pain of making changes.
C has been designed to make functions efficient and easy to use; C programs generally consist of numerous small functions rather than a few big ones. A program may reside on one or more source files in any convenient way; the source files may be compiled separately and loaded together, along with previously compiled functions from libraries. We will not go into that process here, since the details vary according to the local system.
Most programmers are familiar with "library" functions for input and output (getchar, putchar) and numerical computation (sin, cos, sqrt). In this chapter we will show more about writing new functions.
Chapter 5: Pointers and arrays
A pointer is a variable that contains the address of another variable. Pointers are very much used in C, partly because they are sometimes the only way to express a computation, and partly because they usually lead to more compact and efficient code than can be obtained in other ways.
Pointers have been lumped with the goto statement as a marvelous way to create impossible-to-understand programs. This is certainly true when they are used carelessly, and it is easy to create pointers that point somewhere unexpected. With discipline, however, pointers can also be used to achieve clarity and simplicity. This is the aspect that we will try to illustrate.
Chapter 6: Structures
A structure is a collection of one or more variables, possibly of different types, grouped together under a single name for convenient handling. (Structures are called "records" in some languages, most notably Pascal.)
The traditional example of a structure is the payroll record: an "employee" is described by a set of attributes such as name, address, social security number, salary, etc. Some of these in turn could be structures: a name has several components, as does and address and even a salary.
Structures help to organize complicated data, particularly in large programs, because in many situations they permit a group of related variables to be treated as a unit instead of as separate entities. In this chapter we will try to illustrate how structures are used. The programs we will use are bigger than many of the others in the book, but still of moderate size.
Chapter 7: Input and output
Input and output facilities are not part of the C language so we have de-emphasized them in our presentation thus far. Nonetheless, real programs do interact with their environment in much more complicated ways than those we have shown before. In this chapter we will describe "the standard I/O library," a set of functions designed to provide a standard I/O system for C programs. The functions are intended to present a convenient programming interface, yet reflect only operations that can be provided on most modern operating systems. The routines are efficient enough that users should seldom feel the need to circumvent them "for efficiency" regardless of how critical the application. Finally, the routines are meant to be "portable," in the sense that they will exist in compatible form on any system where C exists, and that programs which confine their system interactions to facilities provided by the standard library can be moved from one system to another essentially without change.
We will not try to describe the entire I/O library here; we are more interested in showing the essentials of writing C programs that interact with their operating environments.
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