History of C language

History of C Language

C language is general-purpose, structured programming language. Its instructions consist of terms that resemble algebraic expressions, augmented by certain English Keywords such as if, else, for, do and while.

C seems a strange name for a programming language. But this is strange sounding language is one of the most popular computer languages today because it is a structured, high-level, machine independent language.

C was originally developed in 1970s by Dennis Ritchie at Bell Telephone Laboratories.  It is an outgrowth of two earlier languages, called BCPL and B, which were also developed at Bell Laboratories.

The increasing popularity of c is probably due to its many desirable qualities. It is a robust language whose rich set of built-in functions and operators can be used to write any complex program. The C compiler combines the capabilities of an assembly language with the features of high-level language and therefore it will suited for writing both system software and business packages.

Programs written in C language are efficient and fast. This is due to its variety of data types and powerful operators. It is many times faster than BASIC e.g. A program to increment a variable from 0 – 15000 takes about one second in C while it takes more than 50 seconds in an interpreter BASIC.

C is highly portable. This means that C programs written for one computer can be run on another computer with little or no modification.

C language is well suited for structured programming, thus requiring the user to think of a problem in terms of function modules or block. A proper collection of these modules would make a complete program. This modules structure makes program will makes program debugging, testing and maintenance easier.