INTRODUCTION TO

C PROGRAMMING
(21CS107)
IMPORTANCE OF C
• C programming language is most popular programming language.
• C was created in 1972 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Labs in USA as a
part of UNIX operating system.
• C was also used to develop some parts of this operating system.
FEATURES OF C
• Programs Written in C are efficient and fast.
• C is highly portable this means that programs once written can be run on
another machines.
• Another important feature of C program is its ability to extend itself.
• A C program is basically a collection of functions that are supported by C
library. We can also create our own function and add it to C library.
• C language is the most widely used language.
STRUCTURE OF C PROGRAM
• A C program involves the following sections:
• Documentations (Documentation Section)
• Pre-processor Statements (Link Section)
• Global Declarations (Definition Section)
• The main() function
• Local Declarations
• Program Statements & Expressions
• User Defined Functions
DOCUMENTATION SECTION / COMMENTS –
• They are two types of comments:
• Single – line comment.
• Multi – line comment.

• Single – line Comment: It starts with two forward slashes (i.e

//) and is automatically terminated with the end – of the line.
The first line of our program is a single line comment.
• Multi – line Comment: It starts with /* and terminates with */. It
is used when multiple lines of text are to be commented.
 PRE-PROCESSOR DIRECTIVE SECTION
The following points must be remembered while writing a pre-processor
directives:
• The pre-processor directive should always start with hash symbol (#).
• The # symbol should be the first non-white space character in a line.
• It will terminated with the new line character not with semicolon.
• Pre-processor directives are executed before the compiler compiles the
source code.
 SOME IMPORTANT PRE-PROCESSOR
DIRECTIVES:
#define Substitutes a pre-processor Macro (constant)
#include Inserts a particular header file from another file.

#ifdef Returns true if the macro is defined.

#ifndef Returns true if the macro is not defined.
#if Tests if a compile time condition is true.
#else The alternative of #if.
#elif #if and #else in one statement.
#endif Ends pre-processor conditional statement.

#error Prints error message on console output device.

GLOBAL DECLARATION SECTION-
• In this section global variables and user defined functions are
declared before main().
• These functions can be accessed by the all used defined functions
including main().
• If a user defined function or a variable is not declared in this
section it will not accessed by the remaining functions.
FUNCTION SECTION –
This section is mandatory. This section have one or more functions. A
function named main() is always required. Every function consists of two
parts:
• Header of the Function.
• Body of the Function.
Header of the Function:
• The general form of the header of the function is:
• [return-type] function_name([argument_list])
• The terms enclosed within square brackets are optional.
BODY OF THE FUNCTION:
• The body of a function consists of a set of statements enclosed
with in braces{}. And these statements are of two types:
• Non – Executable Statements (Ex – Declaration Statements)
• Executable Statements (Ex – Function call statements like printf()..)
• It is possible that no statement present within the braces. In such
case the program produces no output on execution.
• If any statements present in the function non-executable statements
should present prior to the executable statements.
A SIMPLE PROGRAM THAT PRINTS HELLO
WORLD!
// Comment: First C program
#include<stdio.h>
main()
{
printf(“Hello World! \n”);

}
Output:
Hello World!
COMPILE AND EXECUTE A C PROGRAM
• Open a text editor and add the above mentioned code.
• Save the file as hello.c.
• Open command prompt and go to the directory where we have saved the file.
• Type cc file_name.c and press enter to compile our code.
• If there are no errors in our code, the command prompt will take you to the next line and
would generate a.out executable file.
• Now type ./a.out to execute our program.
• Finally we will get output.
• $cc hello.c
• $./a.out
• Hello world!
C TOKENS
• C CHARACTER SET
• IDENTIFIERS
• KEYWORDS,
• TYPE QUALIFIERS
• TYPE MODIFIERS
• VARIABLES
• CONSTANTS
• PUNCTUATIONS AND
• OPERATORS
C CHARACTER SET
• A character set defines the valid characters that can be
used in a source program (or) interpreted when a
program is running.
SOURCE CHARACTER SET
This character set is used to construct
statements in a source program.
Alphabets A to Z and a to z

Digits 0 to 9

Special +,-,*,!,<,>,?, @, #. The others are listed below in detail

characters
Whitespaces Blank space, horizontal tab, vertical tab, new line, form feed
 SPECIAL CHARACTERS ARE LISTED BELOW
Symbol Name Symbol Name
~ Tilde - Minus sign
! Exclamation Mark = Equal to sign
# Number sign { Left flower brace
$ Dollar sign } right flower brace
% Percentage sign [ Left bracket
^ Caret ] Right bracket
& Ampersand : Colon
* Asterisk “ Quotation mark
( Left Parenthesis < Opening angle bracket (less than
sign)
) Right Parenthesis ; Semicolon
_ Underscore > Closing angle bracket (greater than
sign)
+ Plus sign ? Question mark
| Vertical bar , Comma
\ Backslash . Period (dot)
‘ Apostrophe / Slash
@ At symbol
EXECUTION CHARACTER SET
• These are used at the time of execution. They are also
known as non graphic characters, symbols or escape
sequences. Some of them are given below.
Symbol Name Symbol Name
‘\b’ Blank space '\r' Carriage return
'\n' Newline '\v' Vertical tab
'\t' Horizontal tab
IDENTIFIERS
An Identifier refers to the name of an object. It can be a variable name,
a function name, a typedef name, a macro name, or a structure name, or
a union name.
• The syntactic rules to write an identifier name in C are as follows:
• It should have letters, digits or underscores.
• The first character of an identifier must be a letter not digit.
• No special characters can be used (, ).
• Keywords are not used for identifiers.
• The maximum number of letters in an identifier depends on compiler.
• Ex: Student_Name, StudentName, Student123..
 KEYWORDS
• Keyword is a reserved word that has a particular meaning in the
programming language.
• The meaning of the keyword is predefined.
• A keyword cannot be used as an identifier name in C language.
• There are 32 keywords available in C. The following table shows
the list of keywords:
KEYWORDS
auto double int struct
break else long switch
case enum register typedef
char extern return union
const float short unsigned
continue for signed void
default goto sizeof volatile
Do if static while
TYPE QUALIFIERS AND TYPE MODIFIERS –

• The declaration statement can optionally have type qualifiers or

type modifiers or both.
• Type qualifiers –
• C – type qualifiers: The keywords which are used to modify the properties
of a variable are called type qualifiers.
• There are two types of qualifiers available in C language. They are:
• Const
• volatile
TYPE QUALIFIERS AND TYPE MODIFIERS –

Type Modifiers -
A type modifier alter the meaning of the base data type to
yield a new type. There are four types of modifiers in C they are
• signed
• unsigned
• short
• long
 VARIABLES IN C
✓ Variable is defined as the reserved memory space which stores a
value of a definite datatype.
✓ The value of the Variable is not constant, instead, it allows changes.
✓ There are mainly five types of variables supported in C.
• Local variable
• Global variable
• Static variable
• Automatic variable
• External variable 99
Local Variables
A variable that is declared at the inside a code block or a function and has the scope
confined to that particular block of code or function is called to be a local variable.
void vignan()
{
int Local_variable=10;
}

Global Variables
A variable that is declared at the outside a code block or a function and has the scope
across the entire program and allows any function to change it’s value is known as
Global Variable.
int Global_variable=10;
void vignan()
{
int Local_variable=20; 100

}
Static Variables

✓ Any variable that is declared using the keyword static is known as a Static Variable.
✓ Static variables retain the declared value throughout the entire execution of the
program and will not be changed between multiple function calls.

#include<stdio.h> #include<stdio.h>
int fun() int fun()
{ {
static int count = 0; int count = 0;
count++; 12 count++; 11
return count; return count;
} }
int main() int main()
{ {
printf("%d ", fun()); printf("%d ", fun());
printf("%d ", fun()); printf("%d ", fun()); 101
return 0; return 0;
} }
Auto Variables
Automatic Variables can be declared by using the keyword auto.
void main()
{
int Local_variable=10; //(automatic default)
auto int auto=20; //(automatic variable)
};

External Variables
External Variables are declared by using the extern keyword. External variable can be
shared among multiple C source files.

extern external=10;

102
CONSTANTS
• A Constant is an entity whose value remains the same throughout the
execution of the program. These fixed values are also called as Literals.
They are classified into three types:

1. Literal Constants.
2. Qualified Constants.
3. Symbolic Constants.
1. LITERAL CONSTANTS

They are just called as Literals denotes a fixed value, which may be an
integer, floating point number, character or a string.

• Integer Literal Constant

• An integer literal can be a decimal, octal, or hexadecimal constant. A prefix specifies the
base or radix: 0x or 0X for hexadecimal, 0 for octal, and nothing for decimal.
INTEGER LITERAL CONSTANT
• Following are other examples of various types of integer literals −

• 85 /* decimal */

• 0213 /* octal */

• 0x4b /* hexadecimal */

• 30 /* int */

• 30u /* unsigned int */

• 30l /* long */

• 30ul /* unsigned long */

 FLOATING POINT LITERAL CONSTANT

It can be written in a Fractional form or Exponential Form. The rules for

writing floating point literal constants are:

1. A fractional floating point literal constant must have at least one

digit.

2. It should have a decimal point.

3. It can be either positive or negative.

4. No special characters or blank spaces are allowed.

FLOATING POINT LITERAL CONSTANT

• Here are some examples of floating-point literals −

• 3.1413 // Legal
• 3.14159E-5L //Legal
• 210f // Illegal: No decimal or Exponent
• .e55 //Illegal: Missing Integer or fraction
CHARACTER LITERAL CONSTANT

It can have one or at most two characters enclosed within single quotes e.g. ‘A’,
‘a’, ‘\n’ etc. These are classified into two types:

1. Printable Character Literal Constant.

2. Non – Printable Character Literal Constant.

Printable Character Literal Constant: All characters of source character set

except quotation mark, backslash, and new line character when enclosed
within a single quotes form a Printable Character Literal Constant. Ex: ‘A’, ‘2’..

Non – Printable Character Literal Constant: These are represented with the
help of ‘Escape Sequences’. An escape sequence consists of backward slash (\)
followed by a character and both enclosed within a single quote. Ex: ‘\n’, ‘\t’..
LIST OF ESCAPE SEQUENCES
S.NO Escape Character Value Action on Output Device
Sequence
1 \’ Single quotation Prints ‘
mark
2 \” Double quotation Prints “
mark
3 \? Question Mark Prints ?
4 \\ Backslash(\) Prints \
5 \a Alert Generates beep sound
6 \b Back space Moves the cursor one position to the left of its current
position.
7 \f Form Feed Moves the cursor to the beginning of the next page
8 \n New line Moves the cursor to the beginning of the next line.
9 \r Carriage Return Moves the cursor to the beginning of the current line.

10 \t Horizontal Tab Moves the cursor to the next horizontal tab stop
STRING LITERAL CONSTANT

• String Literal Constant: It consists of a sequence of

characters. Here each constant is implicitly
terminated by a null character. So the length of the
string constant is +1 than the actual length.
CONSTANTS
Qualified Constants: These are created by using ‘const’ qualifier.

Ex: const int a=10;

Constants are not able to modified, but they are able to access.

Symbolic Constants: These are created with the help of define pre-
processor directive.

Ex: #define pi 3.14

PUNCTUATIONS –

The punctuation and special characters in the C character set have

various uses, from organizing program text to defining the tasks that the
compiler or the compiled program carries out. They do not specify an
operation to be performed.

Syntax

( ) [ ] { } * , : = ; ... #
These characters have special meanings in C. # occurs only in pre-
processor directives.
OPERATORS
An operator is a symbol that tells the compiler to perform specific
mathematical or logical functions. C language is rich in built-in operators
and provides the following types of operators −

1. Arithmetic Operators

2. Relational Operators

3. Logical Operators

4. Assignment Operators
OPERATORS
5. Conditional Operators

6. Special Operators

7. Bitwise operators

8. Increment and decrement operators

9. Unary operators

10. Equality operators