The C programming language is a general-purpose, high-level language that was originally developed by Dennis M.

Ritchie to develop the UNIX operating system at Bell Labs. C was originally first implemented on the DEC PDP-11
computer in 1972.
In 1978, Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie produced the first publicly available description of C, now known as the
K&R standard.
The UNIX operating system, the C compiler, and essentially all UNIX applications programs have been written in C.
The C has now become a widely used professional language for various reasons.

Easy to learn
Structured language
It produces efficient programs

-level activities.
It can be compiled on a variety of computer platforms.

Facts about C
C was invented to write an operating system called UNIX.
C is a successor of B language, which was introduced around 1970.
The language was formalized in 1988 by the American National Standard Institute. (ANSI).
The UNIX OS was totally written in C by 1973.

Today, C is the most widely used and popular System Programming Language.
Most of the state-of-the-art softwares have been implemented using C.
Today's most ][popular Linux OS and RBDMS MySQL have been written in C.
Why to use C?
C was initially used for system development work, in particular the programs that make up the operating system. C was
adopted as a system development language because it produces code that runs nearly as fast as code written in assembly
language. Some examples of the use of C might be:










Utilities
Text Editor
This will be used to type your program. Examples of few editors include Windows Notepad, OS Edit command, Brief,
Epsilon, EMACS, and vim or vi.
Name and version of text editor can vary on different operating systems. For example, Notepad will be used on
Windows, and vim or vi can be used on windows as well as Linux or UNIX.
The files you create with your editor are called source files and contain program source code. The source files for C
programs are typically named with the extension .c.
Before starting your programming, make sure you have one text editor in place and you have enough experience to
write a computer program, save it in a file, compile it and finally execute it.

The C Compiler
The source code written in source file is the human readable source for your program. It needs to be "compiled", to turn
into machine language so that your CPU can actually execute the program as per instructions given.
This C programming language compiler will be used to compile your source code into final executable program. I
assume you have basic knowledge about a programming language compiler.
Most frequently used and free available compiler is GNU C/C++ compiler, otherwise you can have compilers either
from HP or Solaris if you have respective Operating Systems.
C Hello World Example
A C program basically consists of the following parts:






Let us look at a simple code that would print the words "Hello World":
#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
/* my first program in C */
printf("Hello, World! \n");
return 0;
}

1. The first line of the program #include <stdio.h> is a preprocessor command, which tells a C compiler to include
stdio.h file before going to actual compilation.
2. The next line int main() is the main function where program execution begins.
3. The next line /*...*/ will be ignored by the compiler and it has been put to add additional comments in the program.
So such lines are called comments in the program.
4. The next line printf(...) is another function available in C which causes the message "Hello, World!" to be displayed
on the screen.
5. The next line return 0; terminates main()function and returns the value 0.
Compile & ExecuteC Program
Lets look at how to save the source code in a file, and how to compile and run it. Following are the simple steps:
1. Open a text editor and add the above-mentioned code.
2. Save the file as hello.c
3. Open a command prompt and go to the directory where you saved the file.
4. Type gcc hello.c and press enter to compile your code.
5. If there are no errors in your code, the command prompt will take you to the next line and would generate a.out
executable file.
6. Now, type a.out to execute your program.
7. You will be able to see "Hello World" printed on the screen
C Basic Syntax
Tokens in C
A C program consists of various tokens and a token is either a keyword, an identifier, a constant, a string literal, or a
symbol. For example, the following C statement consists of five tokens:
printf("Hello, World! \n");
The individual tokens are:
printf
(
"Hello, World! \n"
)
;
Semicolons ;
In C program, the semicolon is a statement terminator. That is, each individual statement must be ended with a
semicolon. It indicates the end of one logical entity.
For example, following are two different statements:
printf("Hello, World! \n");
return 0;
Comments
Comments are like helping text in your C program and they are ignored by the compiler. They start with /* and
terminates with the characters */ as shown below:
/* my first program in C */
You cannot have comments within comments and they do not occur within a string or character literals.
Identifiers
A C identifier is a name used to identify a variable, function, or any other user-defined item. An identifier starts with a
letter A to Z or a to z or an underscore _ followed by zero or more letters, underscores, and digits (0 to 9).
C does not allow punctuation characters such as @, $, and % within identifiers. C is a case sensitive programming
language. Thus, Manpower and manpower are two different identifiers in C. Here are some examples of acceptable
identifiers:
Mohd zara abc move_name a_123
myname50 _temp j a23b9 retVal
Keywords
The following list shows the reserved words in C. These reserved words may not be used as constant or variable or any
other identifier names.

Whitespace in C
A line containing only whitespace, possibly with a comment, is known as a blank line, and a C compiler totally ignores
it.
Whitespace is the term used in C to describe blanks, tabs, newline characters and comments. Whitespace separates one
part of a statement from another and enables the compiler to identify where one element in a statement, such as int, ends
and the next element begins. Therefore, in the following statement:
int age;
There must be at least one whitespace character (usually a space) between int and age for the compiler to be able to
distinguish them. On the other hand, in the following statement:
fruit = apples + oranges; // get the total fruit
No whitespace characters are necessary between fruit and =, or between = and apples, although you are free to include
some if you wish for readability purpose.
C Data Types
In the C programming language, data types refer to an extensive system used for declaring variables or functions of
different types. The type of a variable determines how much space it occupies in storage and how the bit pattern stored
is interpreted.
The types in C can be classified as follows:
Basic Types: They are arithmetic types and consists of the two types: (a) integer types and (b) floating-point types.
Enumerated types: They are again arithmetic types and they are used to define variables that can only be assigned
certain discrete integer values throughout the program.
The type void: The type specifier void indicates that no value is available.
Derived types: They include (a) Pointer types, (b) Array types, (c) Structure types, (d) Union types and (e) Function
types.
Integer Types
Following table gives you details about standard integer types with its storage sizes and value ranges:
Type Storage size Value range
Char 1 byte -128 to 127 or
0 to 255
unsigned char 1 byte 0 to 255
signed char 1 byte -128 to 127
Int 2 or 4 bytes -32,768 to
32,767 or -
2,147,483,648
to
2,147,483,647
unsigned int 2 or 4 bytes 0 to 65,535 or 0
to
4,294,967,295
Short 2 bytes -32,768 to
32,767
unsigned short 2 bytes 0 to 65,535
Long 4 bytes -2,147,483,648
to
2,147,483,647
unsigned long 4 bytes 0 to
4,294,967,295
To get the exact size of a type or a variable on a particular platform, you can use the sizeof operator. The expressions
sizeof(type) yields the storage size of the object or type in bytes.
Floating-Point Types
Following table gives you details about standard floating-point types with storage sizes and value ranges and their
precision:
Type Storage size Value range Precision
float 4 byte 1.2E-38 to
3.4E+38
6 decimal places
double 8 byte 2.3E-308 to
1.7E+308
15 decimal places
long double 10 byte 3.4E-4932 to
1.1E+4932
19 decimal places
The header file float.h defines macros that allow you to use these values and other details about the binary
representation of real numbers in your programs.
The void Type
The void type specifies that no value is available

The array types and structure types are referred to collectively as the aggregate types. The type of a function specifies
the type of the function's return value.
Integer Types
Following table gives you details about standard integer types with its storage sizes and value ranges:


To get the exact size of a type or a variable on a particular platform, you can use the sizeof operator. The expressions
sizeof(type) yields the storage size of the object or type in bytes. Following is an example to get the size of int type on
any machine:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <limits.h>
int main()
{
printf("Storage size for int : %d \n", sizeof(int));
return 0;
}
When you compile and execute the above program, it produces the following result on Linux:
Storage size for int : 4
Floating-Point Types
Following table gives you details about standard floating-point types with storage sizes and value ranges and their
precision:

The header file float.h defines macros that allow you to use these values and other details about the binary
representation of real numbers in your programs. Following example will print storage space taken by a float type and
its range values:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <float.h>
int main()
{
printf("Storage size for float : %d \n", sizeof(float));
printf("Minimum float positive value: %E\n", FLT_MIN );
printf("Maximum float positive value: %E\n", FLT_MAX );
printf("Precision value: %d\n", FLT_DIG );
return 0;
}
When you compile and execute the above program, it produces the following result on Linux:
Storage size for float : 4
Minimum float positive value: 1.175494E-38
Maximum float positive value: 3.402823E+38
Precision value: 6
The void Type
The void type specifies that no value is available. It is used in three kinds of situations:

The void type may not be understood to you at this point, so let us proceed and we will cover these concepts in the
upcoming chapters.
C Variables
A variable is nothing but a name given to a storage area that our programs can manipulate. Each variable in C has a
specific type, which determines the size and layout of the variable's memory; the range of values that can be stored
within that memory; and the set of operations that can be applied to the variable.
The name of a variable can be composed of letters, digits, and the underscore character. It must begin with either a letter
or an underscore. Upper and lowercase letters are distinct because C is case-sensitive. There will be the following basic
variable types:

Variable Definition in C:
A variable definition means to tell the compiler where and how much to create the storage for the variable. A variable
definition specifies a data type and contains a list of one or more variables of that type as follows:
type variable_list;
Here, type must be a valid C data type including char, w_char, int, float, double, bool or any user-defined object, etc.,
and variable_list may consist of one or more identifier names separated by commas. Some valid declarations are shown
here:
int i, j, k;
char c, ch;
float f, salary;
double d;
The line int i, j, k; both declares and defines the variables i, j and k; which instructs the compiler to create variables
named i, j and k of type int.
Variables can be initialized (assigned an initial value) in their declaration. The initializer consists of an equal sign
followed by a constant expression as follows:
type variable_name = value;
Some examples are:
extern int d = 3, f = 5; // declaration of d and f.
int d = 3, f = 5; // definition and initializing d and f.
byte z = 22; // definition and initializes z.
char x = 'x'; // the variable x has the value 'x'.
For definition without an initializer: variables with static storage duration are implicitly initialized with NULL (all bytes
have the value 0); the initial value of all other variables is undefined.
Variable Declaration in C:
A variable declaration provides assurance to the compiler that there is one variable existing with the given type and
name so that compiler proceed for further compilation without needing complete detail about the variable. A variable
declaration has its meaning at the time of compilation only, compiler needs actual variable declaration at the time of
linking of the program.
A variable declaration is useful when you are using multiple files and you define your variable in one of the files, which
will be available at the time of linking of the program. You will use extern keyword to declare a variable at any place.
Though you can declare a variable multiple times in your C program but it can be defined only once in a file, a function
or a block of code.
Example
Try the following example, where variables have been declared at the top, but they have been defined and initialized
inside the main function:
#include <stdio.h>
// Variable definition:
extern int a, b;
extern int c;
extern float f;
int main ()
{
// Variable definition:
int a, b;
int c;
float f;
// actual initialization
a =10;
b =20;
c = a + b;
printf("value of c : %d \n", c);
f = 70.0/3.0;
printf("value of f : %f \n", f);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of c : 30
value of f : 23.333334
Lvalues and Rvalues in C
There are two kinds of expressions in C:
1. lvalue: An expression that is an lvalue may appear as either the left-hand or right-hand side of an assignment.
2. rvalue: An expression that is an rvalue may appear on the right- but not left-hand side of an assignment.

Variables are lvalues and so may appear on the left-hand side of an assignment. Numeric literals are rvalues and so may
not be assigned and cannot appear on the left-hand side. Following is a valid statement:
int g = 20;
But following is not a valid statement and would generate compile-time error:
10 = 20;
C Constants and Literals
The constants refer to fixed values that the program may not alter during its execution. These fixed values are also
called literals.
Constants can be of any of the basic data types like an integer constant, a floating constant, a character constant, or
a string literal. There are also enumeration constants as well.
The constants are treated just like regular variables except that their values cannot be modified after their definition.
Integer literals
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.
An integer literal can also have a suffix that is a combination of U and L, for unsigned and long, respectively. The suffix
can be uppercase or lowercase and can be in any order.
Here are some examples of integer literals:
212 /* Legal */
215u /* Legal */
0xFeeL /* Legal */
078 /* Illegal: 8 is not an octal digit */
032UU /* Illegal: cannot repeat a suffix */
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 literals
A floating-point literal has an integer part, a decimal point, a fractional part, and an exponent part. You can represent
floating point literals either in decimal form or exponential form.
While representing using decimal form, you must include the decimal point, the exponent, or both and while
representing using exponential form, you must include the integer part, the fractional part, or both. The signed exponent
is introduced by e or E.
Here are some examples of floating-point literals:
3.14159 /* Legal */
314159E-5L /* Legal */
510E /* Illegal: incomplete exponent */
210f /* Illegal: no decimal or exponent */
.e55 /* Illegal: missing integer or fraction */
Character constants
Character literals are enclosed in single quotes, e.g., 'x' and can be stored in a simple variable of char type.
A character literal can be a plain character (e.g., 'x'), an escape sequence (e.g., '\t'), or a universal character (e.g.,
'\u02C0').
There are certain characters in C when they are preceded by a backslash they will have special meaning and they are
used to represent like newline (\n) or tab (\t). Here, you have a list of some of such escape sequence codes:
Escape sequence Meaning
\\ \ character
\' ' character
\" " character
\? ? character
\a Alert or bell
\b Backspace
\f Form feed
\n Newline
\r Carriage return
\t Horizontal tab
\v Vertical tab
\ooo Octal number of one
to three digits
\xhh . . . Hexadecimal number
of one or more digits
Following is the example to show few escape sequence characters:
#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
printf("Hello\tWorld\n\n");
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Hello World
String literals
String literals or constants are enclosed in double quotes "". A string contains characters that are similar to character
literals: plain characters, escape sequences, and universal characters.
You can break a long line into multiple lines using string literals and separating them using whitespaces.
Here are some examples of string literals. All the three forms are identical strings.
"hello, dear"
"hello, \
dear"
"hello, " "d" "ear"
Defining Constants
There are two simple ways in C to define constants:
1. Using #define preprocessor.
2. Using const keyword.

The #define Preprocessor
Following is the form to use #define preprocessor to define a constant:
#define identifier value
Following example explains it in detail:
#include <stdio.h>
#define LENGTH 10
#define WIDTH 5
#define NEWLINE '\n'
int main()
{
int area;
area = LENGTH * WIDTH;
printf("value of area : %d", area);
printf("%c", NEWLINE);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of area : 50
The const Keyword
You can use const prefix to declare constants with a specific type as follows:
const type variable = value;
Following example explains it in detail:
#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
const int LENGTH = 10;
const int WIDTH = 5;
const char NEWLINE = '\n';
int area;
area = LENGTH * WIDTH;
printf("value of area : %d", area);
printf("%c", NEWLINE);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of area : 50
Note that it is a good programming practice to define constants in CAPITALS.
C Storage Classes
A storage class defines the scope (visibility) and life-time of variables and/or functions within a C Program. These
specifiers precede the type that they modify. There are the following storage classes, which can be used in a C Program
to



The auto Storage Class
The auto storage class is the default storage class for all local variables.
{
int mount;
auto int month;
}
The example above defines two variables with the same storage class, auto can only be used within functions, i.e., local
variables.
The register Storage Class
The register storage class is used to define local variables that should be stored in a register instead of RAM. This
means that the variable has a maximum size equal to the register size (usually one word) and can't have the unary '&'
operator applied to it (as it does not have a memory location).
{
register int miles;
}
The register should only be used for variables that require quick access such as counters. It should also be noted that
defining 'register' does not mean that the variable will be stored in a register. It means that it MIGHT be stored in a
register depending on hardware and implementation restrictions.
The static Storage Class
The static storage class instructs the compiler to keep a local variable in existence during the life-time of the program
instead of creating and destroying it each time it comes into and goes out of scope. Therefore, making local variables
static allows them to maintain their values between function calls.
The static modifier may also be applied to global variables. When this is done, it causes that variable's scope to be
restricted to the file in which it is declared.
In C programming, when static is used on a class data member, it causes only one copy of that member to be shared by
all objects of its class.
#include <stdio.h>
/* function declaration */
void func(void);
static int count = 5; /* global variable */
main()
{
while(count--)
{
func();
}
return 0;
}
/* function definition */
void func( void )
{
static int i = 5; /* local static variable */
i++;
printf("i is %d and count is %d\n", i, count);
}
You may not understand this example at this time because I have used function and global variables, which I have not
explained so far. So for now, let us proceed even if you do not understand it completely. When the above code is
compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
i is 6 and count is 4
i is 7 and count is 3
i is 8 and count is 2
i is 9 and count is 1
i is 10 and count is 0
The extern Storage Class
The extern storage class is used to give a reference of a global variable that is visible to ALL the program files. When
you use 'extern', the variable cannot be initialized as all it does is point the variable name at a storage location that has
been previously defined.
When you have multiple files and you define a global variable or function, which will be used in other files also, then
extern will be used in another file to give reference of defined variable or function. Just for understanding, extern is used
to declare a global variable or function in another file.
The extern modifier is most commonly used when there are two or more files sharing the same global variables or
functions as explained below.
First File: main.c
#include <stdio.h>
int count ;
extern void write_extern();
main()
{
write_extern();
}

Second File: write.c
#include <stdio.h>
extern int count;
void write_extern(void)
{
count = 5;
printf("count is %d\n", count);
}
Here, extern keyword is being used to declare count in the second file where as it has its definition in the first file,
main.c. Now, compile these two files as follows:

$gcc main.c write.c
This will produce a.out executable program, when this program is executed, it produces the following result:
5

C Operators
An operator is a symbol that tells the compiler to perform specific mathematical or logical manipulations. C language is
rich in built-in operators and provides the following types of operators:





Misc Operators
This tutorial will explain the arithmetic, relational, logical, bitwise, assignment and other operators one by one.
Arithmetic Operators
Following table shows all the arithmetic operators supported by C language. Assume variable A holds 10 and variable B
holds 20, then:


Try the following example to understand all the arithmetic operators available in C programming language:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int a = 21;
int b = 10;
int c ;
c = a + b;
printf("Line 1 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a - b;
printf("Line 2 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a * b;
printf("Line 3 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a / b;
printf("Line 4 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a % b;
printf("Line 5 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a++;
printf("Line 6 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a--;
printf("Line 7 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
}
When you compile and execute the above program, it produces the following result:

Line 1 - Value of c is 31
Line 2 - Value of c is 11
Line 3 - Value of c is 210
Line 4 - Value of c is 2
Line 5 - Value of c is 1
Line 6 - Value of c is 21
Line 7 - Value of c is 22

Relational Operators
Following table shows all the relational operators supported by C language. Assume variable A holds 10 and variable B
holds 20, then:
Operator Description Example


Try the following example to understand all the relational operators available in C programming language:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int a = 21;
int b = 10;
int c ;
if( a == b )
{
printf("Line 1 - a is equal to b\n" );
}
else
{
printf("Line 1 - a is not equal to b\n" );
}
if ( a < b )
{
printf("Line 2 - a is less than b\n" );
}
else
{
printf("Line 2 - a is not less than b\n" );
}
if ( a > b )
{
printf("Line 3 - a is greater than b\n" );
}
else
{
printf("Line 3 - a is not greater than b\n" );
}
/* Lets change value of a and b */
a = 5;
b = 20;
if ( a <= b )
{
printf("Line 4 - a is either less than or equal to b\n" );
}
if ( b >= a )
{
printf("Line 5 - b is either greater than or equal to b\n" );
}
}
When you compile and execute the above program, it produces the following result:
Line 1 - a is not equal to b
Line 2 - a is not less than b
Line 3 - a is greater than b
Line 4 - a is either less than or equal to b
Line 5 - b is either greater than or equal to b
Logical Operators
Following table shows all the logical operators supported by C language. Assume variable A holds 1 and variable B
holds 0, then:

Try the following example to understand all the logical operators available in C programming language:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int a = 5;
int b = 20;
int c ;
if ( a && b )
{
printf("Line 1 - Condition is true\n" );
}
if ( a || b )
{
printf("Line 2 - Condition is true\n" );
}
/* lets change the value of a and b */
a = 0;
b = 10;
if ( a && b )
{
printf("Line 3 - Condition is true\n" );
}
else
{
printf("Line 3 - Condition is not true\n" );
}
if ( !(a && b) )
{
printf("Line 4 - Condition is true\n" );
}
}
When you compile and execute the above program, it produces the following result:
Line 1 - Condition is true
Line 2 - Condition is true
Line 3 - Condition is not true
Line 4 - Condition is true
Bitwise Operators
Bitwise operator works on bits and performs bit-by-bit operation. The truth tables for &, |, and ^ are as follows:

Assume if A = 60; and B = 13; now in binary format they will be as follows:
A = 0011 1100
B = 0000 1101
-----------------
A&B = 0000 1100
A|B = 0011 1101
A^B = 0011 0001
~A = 1100 0011
The Bitwise operators supported by C language are listed in the following table. Assume variable A holds 60 and
variable B holds 13, then:

Try the following example to understand all the bitwise operators available in C programming language:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
unsigned int a = 60; /* 60 = 0011 1100 */
unsigned int b = 13; /* 13 = 0000 1101 */
int c = 0;
c = a & b; /* 12 = 0000 1100 */
printf("Line 1 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a | b; /* 61 = 0011 1101 */
printf("Line 2 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a ^ b; /* 49 = 0011 0001 */
printf("Line 3 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = ~a; /*-61 = 1100 0011 */
printf("Line 4 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a << 2; /* 240 = 1111 0000 */
printf("Line 5 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
c = a >> 2; /* 15 = 0000 1111 */
printf("Line 6 - Value of c is %d\n", c );
}
When you compile and execute the above program, it produces the following result:
Line 1 - Value of c is 12
Line 2 - Value of c is 61
Line 3 - Value of c is 49
Line 4 - Value of c is -61
Line 5 - Value of c is 240
Line 6 - Value of c is 15
Assignment Operators
There are following assignment operators supported by C language:


Try the following example to understand all the assignment operators available in C programming language:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int a = 21;
int c ;
c = a;
printf("Line 1 - = Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c += a;
printf("Line 2 - += Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c -= a;
printf("Line 3 - -= Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c *= a;
printf("Line 4 - *= Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c /= a;
printf("Line 5 - /= Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c = 200;
c %= a;
printf("Line 6 - %= Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c <<= 2;
printf("Line 7 - <<= Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c >>= 2;
printf("Line 8 - >>= Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c &= 2;
printf("Line 9 - &= Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c ^= 2;
printf("Line 10 - ^= Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
c |= 2;
printf("Line 11 - |= Operator Example, Value of c = %d\n", c );
}
When you compile and execute the above program, it produces the following result:
Line 1 - = Operator Example, Value of c = 21
Line 2 - += Operator Example, Value of c = 42
Line 3 - -= Operator Example, Value of c = 21
Line 4 - *= Operator Example, Value of c = 441
Line 5 - /= Operator Example, Value of c = 21
Line 6 - %= Operator Example, Value of c = 11
Line 7 - <<= Operator Example, Value of c = 44
Line 8 - >>= Operator Example, Value of c = 11
Line 9 - &= Operator Example, Value of c = 2
Line 10 - ^= Operator Example, Value of c = 0
Line 11 - |= Operator Example, Value of c = 2
Misc Operators sizeof & ternary
There are few other important operators including sizeof and ? : supported by C Language

Operators Precedence in C
Operator precedence determines the grouping of terms in an expression. This affects how an expression is evaluated.
Certain operators have higher precedence than others; for example, the multiplication operator has higher precedence
than the addition operator.
For example, x = 7 + 3 * 2; here, x is assigned 13, not 20 because operator * has higher precedence than +, so it first
gets multiplied with 3*2 and then adds into 7.
Here, operators with the highest precedence appear at the top of the table, those with the lowest appear at the bottom.
Within an expression, higher precedence operators will be evaluated first.


Try the following example to understand the operator precedence available in C programming language:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int a = 20;
int b = 10;
int c = 15;
int d = 5;
int e;
e = (a + b) * c / d; // ( 30 * 15 ) / 5
printf("Value of (a + b) * c / d is : %d\n", e );
e = ((a + b) * c) / d; // (30 * 15 ) / 5
printf("Value of ((a + b) * c) / d is : %d\n" , e );
e = (a + b) * (c / d); // (30) * (15/5)
printf("Value of (a + b) * (c / d) is : %d\n", e );
e = a + (b * c) / d; // 20 + (150/5)
printf("Value of a + (b * c) / d is : %d\n" , e );
return 0;
}
When you compile and execute the above program, it produces the following result:
Value of (a + b) * c / d is : 90
Value of ((a + b) * c) / d is : 90
Value of (a + b) * (c / d) is : 90
Value of a + (b * c) / d is : 50
Decision Making in C
Decision making structures require that the programmer specify one or more conditions to be evaluated or tested by the
program, along with a statement or statements to be executed if the condition is determined to be true, and optionally,
other statements to be executed if the condition is determined to be false.
Following is the general form of a typical decision making structure found in most of the programming languages:

C programming language assumes any non-zero and non-null values as true, and if it is either zero or null, then it is
assumed as false value. C programming language provides following types of decision making statements.
if statement
An if statement consists of a boolean expression followed by one or more statements.
Syntax
The syntax of an if statement in C programming language is:
if(boolean_expression)
{
/* statement(s) will execute if the boolean expression is true */
}
If the boolean expression evaluates to true, then the block of code inside the if statement will be executed. If boolean
expression evaluates to false, then the first set of code after the end of the if statement (after the closing curly brace) will
be executed.
C programming language assumes any non-zero and non-null values as true and if it is either zero or null then it is
assumed as false value.
Flow Diagram

Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 10;
/* check the boolean condition using if statement */
if( a < 20 )
{
/* if condition is true then print the following */
printf("a is less than 20\n" );
}
printf("value of a is : %d\n", a);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
a is less than 20;
value of a is : 10
if...else statement
An if statement can be followed by an optional else statement, which executes when the boolean expression is false.
Syntax
The syntax of an if...else statement in C programming language is:
if(boolean_expression)
{
/* statement(s) will execute if the boolean expression is true */
}
else
{
/* statement(s) will execute if the boolean expression is false */
}
If the boolean expression evaluates to true, then the if block of code will be executed, otherwise else block of code will
be executed.
C programming language assumes any non-zero and non-null values as true and if it is either zero or null then it is
assumed as false value.

Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 100;
/* check the boolean condition */
if( a < 20 )
{
/* if condition is true then print the following */
printf("a is less than 20\n" );
}
else
{
/* if condition is false then print the following */
printf("a is not less than 20\n" );
}
printf("value of a is : %d\n", a);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
a is not less than 20;
value of a is : 100
The if...else if...else Statement
An if statement can be followed by an optional else if...else statement, which is very useful to test various conditions
using single if...else if statement.
When using if , else if , else statements there are few points to keep in mind:
if can have zero or one else's and it must come after any else if's.
if can have zero to many else if's and they must come before the else.
else if succeeds, none of the remaining else if's or else's will be tested.

Syntax
The syntax of an if...else if...else statement in C programming language is:
if(boolean_expression 1)
{
/* Executes when the boolean expression 1 is true */
}
else if( boolean_expression 2)
{
/* Executes when the boolean expression 2 is true */
}
else if( boolean_expression 3)
{
/* Executes when the boolean expression 3 is true */
}
else
{
/* executes when the none of the above condition is true */
}
Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 100;
/* check the boolean condition */
if( a == 10 )
{
/* if condition is true then print the following */
printf("Value of a is 10\n" );
}
else if( a == 20 )
{
/* if else if condition is true */
printf("Value of a is 20\n" );
}
else if( a == 30 )
{
/* if else if condition is true */
printf("Value of a is 30\n" );
}
else
{
/* if none of the conditions is true */
printf("None of the values is matching\n" );
}
printf("Exact value of a is: %d\n", a );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
None of the values is matching
Exact value of a is: 100
Nested if statements
It is always legal in C programming to nest if-else statements, which means you can use one if or else if statement
inside another if or else if statement(s).
Syntax
The syntax for a nested if statement is as follows:
if( boolean_expression 1)
{
/* Executes when the boolean expression 1 is true */
if(boolean_expression 2)
{
/* Executes when the boolean expression 2 is true */
}
}
You can nest else if...else in the similar way as you have nested if statement.
Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 100;
int b = 200;
/* check the boolean condition */
if( a == 100 )
{
/* if condition is true then check the following */
if( b == 200 )
{
/* if condition is true then print the following */
printf("Value of a is 100 and b is 200\n" );
}
}
printf("Exact value of a is : %d\n", a );
printf("Exact value of b is : %d\n", b );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Value of a is 100 and b is 200
Exact value of a is : 100
Exact value of b is : 200
switch statement
A switch statement allows a variable to be tested for equality against a list of values. Each value is called a case, and the
variable being switched on is checked for each switch case.
Syntax
The syntax for a switch statement in C programming language is as follows:
switch(expression){
case constant-expression :
statement(s);
break; /* optional */
case constant-expression :
statement(s);
break; /* optional */
/* you can have any number of case statements */
default : /* Optional */
statement(s);
}
The following rules apply to a switch statement:
expression used in a switch statement must have an integral or enumerated type, or be of a class type in which
the class has a single conversion function to an integral or enumerated type.

ollowed by the value to be compared to
and a colon.
constant-expression for a case must be the same data type as the variable in the switch, and it must be a constant
or a literal.
ments following that case will execute until a break
statement is reached.
break statement is reached, the switch terminates, and the flow of control jumps to the next line following
the switch statement.
break. If no break appears, the flow of control will fall through to subsequent
cases until a break is reached.
switch statement can have an optional default case, which must appear at the end of the switch. The default case
can be used for performing a task when none of the cases is true. No break is needed in the default case.
Flow Diagram

Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
char grade = 'B';
switch(grade)
{
case 'A' :
printf("Excellent!\n" );
break;
case 'B' :
case 'C' :
printf("Well done\n" );
break;
case 'D' :
printf("You passed\n" );
break;
case 'F' :
printf("Better try again\n" );
break;
default :
printf("Invalid grade\n" );
}
printf("Your grade is %c\n", grade );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Well done
Your grade is B
Nested switch statements
It is possible to have a switch as part of the statement sequence of an outer switch. Even if the case constants of the
inner and outer switch contain common values, no conflicts will arise.
Syntax
The syntax for a nested switch statement is as follows:
switch(ch1) {
case 'A':
printf("This A is part of outer switch" );
switch(ch2) {
case 'A':
printf("This A is part of inner switch" );
break;
case 'B': /* case code */
}
break;
case 'B': /* case code */
}
Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 100;
int b = 200;
switch(a) {
case 100:
printf("This is part of outer switch\n", a );
switch(b) {
case 200:
printf("This is part of inner switch\n", a );
}
}
printf("Exact value of a is : %d\n", a );
printf("Exact value of b is : %d\n", b );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
This is part of outer switch
This is part of inner switch
Exact value of a is : 100
Exact value of b is : 200
The ? : Operator
We have covered conditional operator ? : in previous chapter which can be used to replace if...else statements. It has the
following general form:
Exp1 ? Exp2 : Exp3;
Where Exp1, Exp2, and Exp3 are expressions. Notice the use and placement of the colon.
The value of a ? expression is determined like this: Exp1 is evaluated. If it is true, then Exp2 is evaluated and becomes
the value of the entire ? expression. If Exp1 is false, then Exp3 is evaluated and its value becomes the value of the
expression.
CLoops
There may be a situation, when you need to execute a block of code several number of times. In general, statements are
executed sequentially: The first statement in a function is executed first, followed by the second, and so on.
Programming languages provide various control structures that allow for more complicated execution paths.
A loop statement allows us to execute a statement or group of statements multiple times and following is the general
form of a loop statement in most of the programming languages

C programming language provides the following types of loops to handle looping requirements.
while loop in C
A while loop statement in C programming language repeatedly executes a target statement as long as a given condition
is true.
Syntax
The syntax of a while loop in C programming language is:
while(condition)
{
statement(s);
}
Here, statement(s) may be a single statement or a block of statements. The condition may be any expression, and true is
any nonzero value. The loop iterates while the condition is true.
When the condition becomes false, program control passes to the line immediately following the loop.
Flow Diagram

Here, key point of the while loop is that the loop might not ever run. When the condition is tested and the result is false,
the loop body will be skipped and the first statement after the while loop will be executed.
Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 10;
/* while loop execution */
while( a < 20 )
{
printf("value of a: %d\n", a);
a++;
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of a: 10
value of a: 11
value of a: 12
value of a: 13
value of a: 14
value of a: 15
value of a: 16
value of a: 17
value of a: 18
value of a: 19
for loop in C
A for loop is a repetition control structure that allows you to efficiently write a loop that needs to execute a specific
number of times.
Syntax
The syntax of a for loop in C programming language is:
for ( init; condition; increment )
{
statement(s);
}
Here is the flow of control in a for loop:
1. The init step is executed first, and only once. This step allows you to declare and initialize any loop control variables.
You are not required to put a statement here, as long as a semicolon appears.

2. Next, the condition is evaluated. If it is true, the body of the loop is executed. If it is false, the body of the loop does
not execute and flow of control jumps to the next statement just after the for loop.

3. After the body of the for loop executes, the flow of control jumps back up to the increment statement. This statement
allows you to update any loop control variables. This statement can be left blank, as long as a semicolon appears after
the condition.
4. The condition is now evaluated again. If it is true, the loop executes and the process repeats itself (body of loop, then
increment step, and then again condition). After the condition becomes false, the for loop terminates.

Flow Diagram

Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* for loop execution */
for( int a = 10; a < 20; a = a + 1 )
{
printf("value of a: %d\n", a);
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of a: 10
value of a: 11
value of a: 12
value of a: 13
value of a: 14
value of a: 15
value of a: 16
value of a: 17
value of a: 18
value of a: 19
do...while loop in C
Unlike for and while loops, which test the loop condition at the top of the loop, the do...while loop
in C programming language checks its condition at the bottom of the loop.
A do...while loop is similar to a while loop, except that a do...while loop is guaranteed to execute
at least one time.
Syntax
The syntax of a do...while loop in C programming language is:
do
{
statement(s);
}while( condition );
Notice that the conditional expression appears at the end of the loop, so the statement(s) in the loop
execute once before the condition is tested.
If the condition is true, the flow of control jumps back up to do, and the statement(s) in the loop
execute again. This process repeats until the given condition becomes false.
Flow Diagram

Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 10;
/* do loop execution */
do
{
printf("value of a: %d\n", a);
a = a + 1;
}while( a < 20 );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of a: 10
value of a: 11
value of a: 12
value of a: 13
value of a: 14
value of a: 15
value of a: 16
value of a: 17
value of a: 18
value of a: 19
nested loops in C
C programming language allows to use one loop inside another loop. Following section shows few
examples to illustrate the concept.
Syntax
The syntax for a nested for loop statement in C is as follows:
for ( init; condition; increment )
{
for ( init; condition; increment )
{
statement(s);
}
statement(s);
}
The syntax for a nested while loop statement in C programming language is as follows:
while(condition)
{
while(condition)
{
statement(s);
}
statement(s);
}
The syntax for a nested do...while loop statement in C programming language is as follows:
do
{
statement(s);
do
{
statement(s);
}while( condition );
}while( condition );
A final note on loop nesting is that you can put any type of loop inside of any other type of loop.
For example, a for loop can be inside a while loop or vice versa.
Example
The following program uses a nested for loop to find the prime numbers from 2 to 100:
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int i, j;
for(i=2; i<100; i++) {
for(j=2; j <= (i/j); j++)
if(!(i%j)) break; // if factor found, not prime
if(j > (i/j)) printf("%d is prime\n", i);
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
2 is prime
3 is prime
5 is prime
7 is prime
11 is prime
13 is prime
17 is prime
19 is prime
23 is prime
29 is prime
31 is prime
37 is prime
41 is prime
43 is prime
47 is prime
53 is prime
59 is prime
61 is prime
67 is prime
71 is prime
73 is prime
79 is prime
83 is prime
89 is prime
97 is prime
break statement in C
The break statement in C programming language has the following two usages:
1. When the break statement is encountered inside a loop, the loop is immediately terminated and
program control resumes at the next statement following the loop.

2. It can be used to terminate a case in the switch statement (covered in the next chapter).

If you are using nested loops (i.e., one loop inside another loop), the break statement will stop the
execution of the innermost loop and start executing the next line of code after the block.
Syntax
The syntax for a break statement in C is as follows:
break;
Flow Diagram

Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 10;
/* while loop execution */
while( a < 20 )
{
printf("value of a: %d\n", a);
a++;
if( a > 15)
{
/* terminate the loop using break statement */
break;
}
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of a: 10
value of a: 11
value of a: 12
value of a: 13
value of a: 14
value of a: 15
continue statement in C
The continue statement in C programming language works somewhat like the break statement.
Instead of forcing termination, however, continue forces the next iteration of the loop to take place,
skipping any code in between.
For the for loop, continue statement causes the conditional test and increment portions of the loop
to execute. For the while and do...while loops, continue statement causes the program control
passes to the conditional tests.
Syntax
The syntax for a continue statement in C is as follows:
continue;
Flow Diagram

Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 10;
/* do loop execution */
do
{
if( a == 15)
{
/* skip the iteration */
a = a + 1;
continue;
}
printf("value of a: %d\n", a);
a++;
}while( a < 20 );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of a: 10
value of a: 11
value of a: 12
value of a: 13
value of a: 14
value of a: 16
value of a: 17
value of a: 18
value of a: 19
goto statement in C
A goto statement in C programming language provides an unconditional jump from the goto to a
labeled statement in the same function.
NOTE: Use of goto statement is highly discouraged in any programming language because it
makes difficult to trace the control flow of a program, making the program hard to understand and
hard to modify. Any program that uses a goto can be rewritten so that it doesn't need the goto.
Syntax
The syntax for a goto statement in C is as follows:
goto label;
..
.
label: statement;
Here label can be any plain text except C keyword and it can be set anywhere in the C program
above or below to goto statement.
Flow Diagram

Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 10;
/* do loop execution */
LOOP:do
{
if( a == 15)
{
/* skip the iteration */
a = a + 1;
goto LOOP;
}
printf("value of a: %d\n", a);
a++;
}while( a < 20 );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of a: 10
value of a: 11
value of a: 12
value of a: 13
value of a: 14
value of a: 16
value of a: 17
value of a: 18
value of a: 19
The Infinite Loop
A loop becomes infinite loop if a condition never becomes false. The for loop is traditionally used
for this purpose. Since none of the three expressions that form the for loop are required, you can
make an endless loop by leaving the conditional expression empty.
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
for( ; ; )
{
printf("This loop will run forever.\n");
}
return 0;
}
When the conditional expression is absent, it is assumed to be true. You may have an initialization
and increment expression, but C programmers more commonly use the for(;;) construct to signify
an infinite loop.
NOTE: You can terminate an infinite loop by pressing Ctrl + C keys.
C Functions
Function is a group of statements that together perform a task. Every C program has at least one
function, which is main(), and all the most trivial programs can define additional functions.
You can divide up your code into separate functions. How you divide up your code among different
functions is up to you, but logically the division usually is so each function performs a specific
task.
A function declaration tells the compiler about a function's name, return type, and parameters. A
function definition provides the actual body of the function.
The C standard library provides numerous built-in functions that your program can call. For
example, function strcat() to concatenate two strings, function memcpy() to copy one memory
location to another location and many more functions.
A function is known with various names like a method or a sub-routine or a procedure, etc.
Defining a Function
The general form of a function definition in C programming language is as follows:
return_type function_name( parameter list )
{
body of the function
}
A function definition in C programming language consists of a function header and a function
body. Here are all the parts of a function:
Return Type: A function may return a value. The return_type is the data type of the value the
function returns. Some functions perform the desired operations without returning a value. In this
case, the return_type is the keyword void.
Function Name: This is the actual name of the function. The function name and the parameter
list together constitute the function signature.
Parameters: A parameter is like a placeholder. When a function is invoked, you pass a value to
the parameter. This value is referred to as actual parameter or argument. The
Parameters are optional; that is, a function may contain no parameters.
Function Body: The function body contains a collection of statements that define what the
function does.
Example
Following is the source code for a function called max(). This function takes two parameters num1
and num2 and returns the maximum between the two:
/* function returning the max between two numbers */
int max(int num1, int num2)
{
/* local variable declaration */
int result;
if (num1 > num2)
result = num1;
else
result = num2;
return result;
}
Function Declarations
A function declaration tells the compiler about a function name and how to call the function. The
actual body of the function can be defined separately.
A function declaration has the following parts:
return_type function_name( parameter list );
For the above defined function max(), following is the function declaration:
int max(int num1, int num2);
Parameter names are not important in function declaration only their type is required, so following
is also valid declaration:
int max(int, int);
Function declaration is required when you define a function in one source file and you call that
function in another file. In such case you should declare the function at the top of the file calling
the function.
Calling a Function
While creating a C function, you give a definition of what the function has to do. To use a function,
you will have to call that function to perform the defined task.
When a program calls a function, program control is transferred to the called function. A called
function performs defined task, and when its return statement is executed or when its function-
ending closing brace is reached, it returns program control back to the main program.
To call a function, you simply need to pass the required parameters along with function name, and
if function returns a value, then you can store returned value. For example:
#include <stdio.h>
/* function declaration */
int max(int num1, int num2);
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 100;
int b = 200;
int ret;
/* calling a function to get max value */
ret = max(a, b);
printf( "Max value is : %d\n", ret );
return 0;
}
/* function returning the max between two numbers */
int max(int num1, int num2)
{
/* local variable declaration */
int result;
if (num1 > num2)
result = num1;
else
result = num2;
return result;
}
I kept max() function along with main() function and compiled the source code. While running
final executable, it would produce the following result:
Max value is : 200
Function Arguments
If a function is to use arguments, it must declare variables that accept the values of the arguments.
These variables are called the formal parameters of the function.
The formal parameters behave like other local variables inside the function and are created upon
entry into the function and destroyed upon exit.
While calling a function, there are two ways that arguments can be passed to a function:
Function call by value
The call by value method of passing arguments to a function copies the actual value of an
argument into the formal parameter of the function. In this case, changes made to the parameter
inside the function have no effect on the argument.
By default, C programming language uses call by value method to pass arguments. In general, this
means that code within a function cannot alter the arguments used to call the function. Consider the
function swap() definition as follows.
/* function definition to swap the values */
void swap(int x, int y)
{
int temp;
temp = x; /* save the value of x */
x = y; /* put y into x */
y = temp; /* put x into y */
return;
}
Now, let us call the function swap() by passing actual values as in the following example:
#include <stdio.h>
/* function declaration */
void swap(int x, int y);
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 100;
int b = 200;
printf("Before swap, value of a : %d\n", a );
printf("Before swap, value of b : %d\n", b );
/* calling a function to swap the values */
swap(a, b);
printf("After swap, value of a : %d\n", a );
printf("After swap, value of b : %d\n", b );
return 0;
}
Let us put above code in a single C file, compile and execute it, it will produce the following result:
Before swap, value of a :100
Before swap, value of b :200
After swap, value of a :100
After swap, value of b :200
Which shows that there is no change in the values though they had been changed inside the
function.
Function call by reference
The call by reference method of passing arguments to a function copies the address of an
argument into the formal parameter. Inside the function, the address is used to access the actual
argument used in the call. This means that changes made to the parameter affect the passed
argument.
To pass the value by reference, argument pointers are passed to the functions just like any other
value. So accordingly you need to declare the function parameters as pointer types as in the
following function swap(), which exchanges the values of the two integer variables pointed to by
its arguments.
/* function definition to swap the values */
void swap(int *x, int *y)
{
int temp;
temp = *x; /* save the value at address x */
*x = *y; /* put y into x */
*y = temp; /* put x into y */
return;
}
Let us call the function swap() by passing values by reference as in the following example:
#include <stdio.h>
/* function declaration */
void swap(int *x, int *y);
int main ()
{
/* local variable definition */
int a = 100;
int b = 200;
printf("Before swap, value of a : %d\n", a );
printf("Before swap, value of b : %d\n", b );
/* calling a function to swap the values.
* &a indicates pointer to a ie. address of variable a and
* &b indicates pointer to b ie. address of variable b.
*/
swap(&a, &b);
printf("After swap, value of a : %d\n", a );
printf("After swap, value of b : %d\n", b );
return 0;
}
Let us put above code in a single C file, compile and execute it, it will produce the following result:
Before swap, value of a :100
Before swap, value of b :200
After swap, value of a :100
After swap, value of b :200
Which shows that there is no change in the values though they had been changed inside the
function.
C Scope Rules
A scope in any programming is a region of the program where a defined variable can have its
existence and beyond that variable cannot be accessed. There are three places where variables can
be declared in C programming language:
local variables,
Outside of all functions which is called global variables.
formal parameters.

Let us explain what are local and global variables and formal parameters.
Local Variables
Variables that are declared inside a function or block are called local variables. They can be used
only by statements that are inside that function or block of code. Local variables are not known to
functions outside their own. Following is the example using local variables. Here all the variables
a, b and c are local to main() function.
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* local variable declaration */
int a, b;
int c;
/* actual initialization */
a = 10;
b = 20;
c = a + b;
printf ("value of a = %d, b = %d and c = %d\n", a, b, c);
return 0;
}
Global Variables
Global variables are defined outside of a function, usually on top of the program. The global
variables will hold their value throughout the lifetime of your program and they can be accessed
inside any of the functions defined for the program.
A global variable can be accessed by any function. That is, a global variable is available for use
throughout your entire program after its declaration. Following is the example using global and
local variables:
#include <stdio.h>
/* global variable declaration */
int g;
int main ()
{
/* local variable declaration */
int a, b;
/* actual initialization */
a = 10;
b = 20;
g = a + b;
printf ("value of a = %d, b = %d and g = %d\n", a, b, g);
return 0;
}
A program can have same name for local and global variables but value of local variable inside a
function will take preference. Following is an example:
#include <stdio.h>
/* global variable declaration */
int g = 20;
int main ()
{
/* local variable declaration */
int g = 10;
printf ("value of g = %d\n", g);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of g = 10
Formal Parameters
Function parameters, so called formal parameters, are treated as local variables within that
function and they will take preference over the global variables. Following is an example:
#include <stdio.h>
/* global variable declaration */
int a = 20;
int main ()
{
/* local variable declaration in main function */
int a = 10;
int b = 20;
int c = 0;
printf ("value of a in main() = %d\n", a);
c = sum( a, b);
printf ("value of c in main() = %d\n", c);
return 0;
}
/* function to add two integers */
int sum(int a, int b)
{
printf ("value of a in sum() = %d\n", a);
printf ("value of b in sum() = %d\n", b);
return a + b;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
value of a in main() = 10
value of a in sum() = 10
value of b in sum() = 20
value of c in main() = 30
Initializing Local and Global Variables
When a local variable is defined, it is not initialized by the system, you must initialize it yourself.
Global variables are initialized automatically by the system when you define them as follows:


It is a good programming practice to initialize variables properly otherwise, your program may
produce unexpected results because uninitialized variables will take some garbage value already
available at its memory location.
C Arrays
Cprogramming language provides a data structure called the array, which can store a fixed-size
sequential collection of elements of the same type. An array is used to store a collection of data,
but it is often more useful to think of an array as a collection of variables of the same type.
Instead of declaring individual variables, such as number0, number1, ..., and number99, you
declare one array variable such as numbers and use numbers[0], numbers[1], and ..., numbers[99]
to represent individual variables. A specific element in an array is accessed by an index.
All arrays consist of contiguous memory locations. The lowest address corresponds to the first
element and the highest address to the last element.

Declaring Arrays
To declare an array in C, a programmer specifies the type of the elements and the number of
elements required by an array as follows:
type arrayName [ arraySize ];
This is called a single-dimensional array. The arraySize must be an integer constant greater than
zero and type can be any valid C data type. For example, to declare a 10-element array called
balance of type double, use this statement:
double balance[10];
Now balance is a variable array which is sufficient to hold up-to 10 double numbers.
Initializing Arrays
You can initialize array in C either one by one or using a single statement as follows:
double balance[5] = {1000.0, 2.0, 3.4, 17.0, 50.0};
The number of values between braces { } can not be larger than the number of elements that we
declare for the array between square brackets [ ]. Following is an example to assign a single
element of the array:
If you omit the size of the array, an array just big enough to hold the initialization is created.
Therefore, if you write:
double balance[] = {1000.0, 2.0, 3.4, 17.0, 50.0};
You will create exactly the same array as you did in the previous example.
balance[4] = 50.0;
The above statement assigns element number 5th in the array a value of 50.0. Array with 4th index
will be 5th i.e. last element because all arrays have 0 as the index of their first element which is
also called base index. Following is the pictorial representation of the same array we discussed
above:

Accessing Array Elements
An element is accessed by indexing the array name. This is done by placing the index of the
element within square brackets after the name of the array. For example:
double salary = balance[9];
The above statement will take 10th element from the array and assign the value to salary variable.
Following is an example which will use all the above mentioned three concepts viz. declaration,
assignment and accessing arrays:
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
int n[ 10 ]; /* n is an array of 10 integers */
int i,j;
/* initialize elements of array n to 0 */
for ( i = 0; i < 10; i++ )
{
n[ i ] = i + 100; /* set element at location i to i + 100 */
}
/* output each array element's value */
for (j = 0; j < 10; j++ )
{
printf("Element[%d] = %d\n", j, n[j] );
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Element[0] = 100
Element[1] = 101
Element[2] = 102
Element[3] = 103
Element[4] = 104
Element[5] = 105
Element[6] = 106
Element[7] = 107
TUTORIALS POINT Simply Easy Learning Page 71
{
n[ i ] = i + 100; /* set element at location i to i + 100 */
}
/* output each array element's value */
for (j = 0; j < 10; j++ )
{
printf("Element[%d] = %d\n", j, n[j] );
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Element[0] = 100
Element[1] = 101
Element[2] = 102
Element[3] = 103
Element[4] = 104
Element[5] = 105
Element[6] = 106
Element[7] = 107
Element[8] = 108
Element[9] = 109
Multi-dimensional Arrays
C programming language allows multidimensional arrays. Here is the general form of a
multidimensional array declaration:
type name[size1][size2]...[sizeN];
For example, the following declaration creates a three dimensional 5 . 10 . 4 integer array:
int threedim[5][10][4];
Two-Dimensional Arrays
The simplest form of the multidimensional array is the two-dimensional array. A two-
dimensional array is, in essence, a list of one-dimensional arrays. To declare a two-dimensional
integer array of size x, y you would write something as follows:
type arrayName [ x ][ y ];
Where type can be any valid C data type and arrayName will be a valid C identifier. A two-
dimensional array can be think as a table which will have x number of rows and y number of
columns. A 2-dimentional array a, which contains three rows and four columns can be shown as
below:

Thus, every element in array a is identified by an element name of the form a[ i ][ j ], where a is the
name of the array, and i and j are the subscripts that uniquely identify each element in a.
Initializing Two-Dimensional Arrays
Multidimensional arrays may be initialized by specifying bracketed values for each row. Following
is an array with 3 rows and each row has 4 columns.
int a[3][4] = {
{0, 1, 2, 3} , /* initializers for row indexed by 0 */
{4, 5, 6, 7} , /* initializers for row indexed by 1 */
{8, 9, 10, 11} /* initializers for row indexed by 2 */
};
The nested braces, which indicate the intended row, are optional. The following initialization is
equivalent to previous example:
int a[3][4] = {0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11};
Accessing Two-Dimensional Array Elements
An element in 2-dimensional array is accessed by using the subscripts, i.e., row index and column
index of the array. For example:
int val = a[2][3];
The above statement will take 4th element from the 3rd row of the array. You can verify it in the
above diagram. Let us check below program where we have used nested loop to handle a two
dimensional array:
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* an array with 5 rows and 2 columns*/
int a[5][2] = { {0,0}, {1,2}, {2,4}, {3,6},{4,8}};
int i, j;
/* output each array element's value */
for ( i = 0; i < 5; i++ )
{
for ( j = 0; j < 2; j++ )
{
printf("a[%d][%d] = %d\n", i,j, a[i][j] );
}
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
a[0][0]: 0
a[0][1]: 0
a[1][0]: 1
a[1][1]: 2
a[2][0]: 2
a[2][1]: 4
a[3][0]: 3
a[3][1]: 6
a[4][0]: 4
a[4][1]: 8
As explained above, you can have arrays with any number of dimensions, although it is likely that
most of the arrays you create will be of one or two dimensions.
Passing Arrays as Function Arguments
If you want to pass a single-dimension array as an argument in a function, you would have to
declare function formal parameter in one of following three ways and all three declaration methods
produce similar results because each tells the compiler that an integer pointer is going to be
received. Similar way you can pass multi-dimensional array as formal parameters.
Way-1
Formal parameters as a pointer as follows. You will study what is pointer in next chapter.
void myFunction(int *param)
{
.
.
.
}
Way-2
Formal parameters as a sized array as follows:
void myFunction(int param[10])
{
.
.
.
}
Way-3
Formal parameters as an unsized array as follows:
void myFunction(int param[])
{
.
.
.
}
Example
Now, consider the following function, which will take an array as an argument along with another
argument and based on the passed arguments, it will return average of the numbers passed through
the array as follows:
double getAverage(int arr[], int size)
{
int i;
double avg;
double sum;
for (i = 0; i < size; ++i)
{
sum += arr[i];
}
avg = sum / size;
return avg;
}
Now, let us call the above function as follows:
#include <stdio.h>
/* function declaration */
double getAverage(int arr[], int size);
int main ()
{
/* an int array with 5 elements */
int balance[5] = {1000, 2, 3, 17, 50};
double avg;
/* pass pointer to the array as an argument */
avg = getAverage( balance, 5 ) ;
/* output the returned value */
printf( "Average value is: %f ", avg );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled together and executed, it produces the following result:
Average value is: 214.400000
As you can see, the length of the array doesn't matter as far as the function is concerned because C
performs no bounds checking for the formal parameters.
Return array from function
C programming language does not allow to return an entire array as an argument to a function.
However, you can return a pointer to an array by specifying the array's name without an index. You
will study pointer in next chapter so you can skip this chapter until you understand the concept of
Pointers in C.
If you want to return a single-dimension array from a function, you would have to declare a
function returning a pointer as in the following example:
int * myFunction()
{
.
.
.
}
Second point to remember is that C does not advocate to return the address of a local variable to
outside of the function so you would have to define the local variable as static variable.
Now, consider the following function which will generate 10 random numbers and return them
using an array and call this function as follows:
#include <stdio.h>
/* function to generate and return random numbers */
int * getRandom( )
{
static int r[10];
int i;
srand( (unsigned)time( NULL ) );
for ( i = 0; i < 10; ++i)
{
r[i] = rand();
printf( "r[%d] = %d\n", i, r[i]);
}
return r;
}
/* main function to call above defined function */
int main ()
{
/* a pointer to an int */
int *p;
int i;
p = getRandom();
for ( i = 0; i < 10; i++ )
{
printf( "*(p + %d) : %d\n", i, *(p + i));
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled together and executed, it produces result something as follows:
r[0] = 313959809
r[1] = 1759055877
r[2] = 1113101911
r[3] = 2133832223
r[4] = 2073354073
r[5] = 167288147
r[6] = 1827471542
r[7] = 834791014
r[8] = 1901409888
r[9] = 1990469526
*(p + 0) : 313959809
*(p + 1) : 1759055877
*(p + 2) : 1113101911
*(p + 3) : 2133832223
*(p + 4) : 2073354073
*(p + 5) : 167288147
*(p + 6) : 1827471542
*(p + 7) : 834791014
*(p + 8) : 1901409888
*(p + 9) : 1990469526
Pointer to an Array
It is most likely that you would not understand this chapter until you are through the chapter related
to Pointers in C.
So assuming you have bit understanding on pointers in C programming language, let us start: An
array name is a constant pointer to the first element of the array. Therefore, in the declaration:
double balance[50];
balance is a pointer to &balance[0], which is the address of the first element of the array balance.
Thus, the following program fragment assigns p the address of the first element of balance:
double *p;
double balance[10];
p = balance;
It is legal to use array names as constant pointers, and vice versa. Therefore, *(balance + 4) is a
legitimate way of accessing the data at balance[4].
Once you store the address of first element in p, you can access array elements using *p, *(p+1),
*(p+2) and so on. Below is the example to show all the concepts discussed above:
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
/* an array with 5 elements */
double balance[5] = {1000.0, 2.0, 3.4, 17.0, 50.0};
double *p;
int i;
p = balance;
/* output each array element's value */
printf( "Array values using pointer\n");
for ( i = 0; i < 5; i++ )
{
printf("*(p + %d) : %f\n", i, *(p + i) );
}
printf( "Array values using balance as address\n");
for ( i = 0; i < 5; i++ )
{
printf("*(balance + %d) : %f\n", i, *(balance + i) );
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Array values using pointer
*(p + 0) : 1000.000000
*(p + 1) : 2.000000
*(p + 2) : 3.400000
*(p + 3) : 17.000000
*(p + 4) : 50.000000
Array values using balance as address
*(balance + 0) : 1000.000000
*(balance + 1) : 2.000000
*(balance + 2) : 3.400000
*(balance + 3) : 17.000000
*(balance + 4) : 50.000000
In the above example, p is a pointer to double, which means it can store address of a variable of
double type. Once we have address in p, then *p will give us value available at the address stored
in p, as we have shown in the above example.
C Pointers
Pointers in C are easy and fun to learn. Some C programming tasks are performed more easily with
pointers, and other tasks, such as dynamic memory allocation, cannot be performed without using
pointers. So it becomes necessary to learn pointers to become a perfect C programmer. Let's start
learning them in simple and easy steps.
As you know, every variable is a memory location and every memory location has its address
defined which can be accessed using ampersand (&) operator, which denotes an address in
memory.
Consider the following example, which will print the address of the variables defined:
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
int var1;
char var2[10];
printf("Address of var1 variable: %x\n", &var1 );
printf("Address of var2 variable: %x\n", &var2 );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces result something as follows:
Address of var1 variable: bff5a400
Address of var2 variable: bff5a3f6
So you understood what is memory address and how to access it, so base of the concept is over.
Now let us see what is a pointer.
What Are Pointers?
A pointer is a variable whose value is the address of another variable, i.e., direct address of the
memory location. Like any variable or constant, you must declare a pointer before you can use it to
store any variable address. The general form of a pointer variable declaration is:
type *var-name;
Here, type is the pointer's base type; it must be a valid C data type and var-name is the name of the
pointer variable. The asterisk * you used to declare a pointer is the same asterisk that you use for
multiplication. However, in this statement the asterisk is being used to designate a variable as a
pointer. Following are the valid pointer declaration:
int *ip; /* pointer to an integer */
double *dp; /* pointer to a double */
float *fp; /* pointer to a float */
char *ch /* pointer to a character */
The actual data type of the value of all pointers, whether integer, float, character, or otherwise, is
the same, a long hexadecimal number that represents a memory address. The only difference
between pointers of different data types is the data type of the variable or constant that the pointer
points to.
How to use Pointers?
There are few important operations, which we will do with the help of pointers very frequently. (a)
we define a pointer variable (b) assign the address of a variable to a pointer and (c) finally access
the value at the address available in the pointer variable. This is done by using unary operator * that
returns the value of the variable located at the address specified by its operand. Following example
makes use of these operations:
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
int var = 20; /* actual variable declaration */
int *ip; /* pointer variable declaration */
ip = &var; /* store address of var in pointer variable*/
printf("Address of var variable: %x\n", &var );
/* address stored in pointer variable */
printf("Address stored in ip variable: %x\n", ip );
/* access the value using the pointer */
printf("Value of *ip variable: %d\n", *ip );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces result something as follows:
Address of var variable: bffd8b3c
Address stored in ip variable: bffd8b3c
Value of *ip variable: 20
NULL Pointers in C
It is always a good practice to assign a NULL value to a pointer variable in case you do not have
exact address to be assigned. This is done at the time of variable declaration. A pointer that is
assigned NULL is called a null pointer.
The NULL pointer is a constant with a value of zero defined in several standard libraries. Consider
the following program:
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
int *ptr = NULL;
printf("The value of ptr is : %x\n", &ptr );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
The value of ptr is 0
On most of the operating systems, programs are not permitted to access memory at address 0
because that memory is reserved by the operating system. However, the memory address 0 has
special significance; it signals that the pointer is not intended to point to an accessible memory
location. But by convention, if a pointer contains the null (zero) value, it is assumed to point to
nothing.
To check for a null pointer you can use an if statement as follows:
if(ptr) /* succeeds if p is not null */
if(!ptr) /* succeeds if p is null */
Pointer arithmetic
As explained in main chapter, C pointer is an address, which is a numeric value. Therefore, you can
perform arithmetic operations on a pointer just as you can a numeric value. There are four
arithmetic operators that can be used on pointers: ++, --, +, and -
To understand pointer arithmetic, let us consider that ptr is an integer pointer which points to the
address 1000. Assuming 32-bit integers, let us perform the following arithmetic operation on the
pointer:
ptr++
Now, after the above operation, the ptr will point to the location 1004 because each time ptr is
incremented, it will point to the next integer location which is 4 bytes next to the current location.
This operation will move the pointer to next memory location without impacting actual value at the
memory location. If ptr points to a character whose address is 1000, then above operation will
point to the location 1001 because next character will be available at 1001.
Incrementing a Pointer
We prefer using a pointer in our program instead of an array because the variable pointer can be
incremented, unlike the array name which cannot be incremented because it is a constant pointer.
The following program increments the variable pointer to access each succeeding element of the
array:
#include <stdio.h>
const int MAX = 3;
int main ()
{
int var[] = {10, 100, 200};
int i, *ptr;
/* let us have array address in pointer */
ptr = var;
for ( i = 0; i < MAX; i++)
{
printf("Address of var[%d] = %x\n", i, ptr );
printf("Value of var[%d] = %d\n", i, *ptr );
/* move to the next location */
ptr++;
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces result something as follows:
Address of var[0] = bf882b30
Value of var[0] = 10
Address of var[1] = bf882b34
Value of var[1] = 100
Address of var[2] = bf882b38
Value of var[2] = 200
Decrementing a Pointer
The same considerations apply to decrementing a pointer, which decreases its value by the number
of bytes of its data type as shown below:
#include <stdio.h>
const int MAX = 3;
int main ()
{
int var[] = {10, 100, 200};
int i, *ptr;
/* let us have array address in pointer */
ptr = &var[MAX-1];
for ( i = MAX; i > 0; i--)
{
printf("Address of var[%d] = %x\n", i, ptr );
printf("Value of var[%d] = %d\n", i, *ptr );
/* move to the previous location */
ptr--;
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and
executed, it produces result something as
follows:
Address of var[3] = bfedbcd8
Value of var[3] = 200
Address of var[2] = bfedbcd4
Value of var[2] = 100
Address of var[1] = bfedbcd0
Value of var[1] = 10
Pointer Comparisons
Pointers may be compared by using relational operators, such as ==, <, and >. If p1 and p2 point to
variables that are related to each other, such as elements of the same array, then p1 and p2 can be
meaningfully compared.
The following program modifies the previous example one by incrementing the variable pointer so
long as the address to which it points is either less than or equal to the address of the last element of
the array, which is &var[MAX - 1]:
#include <stdio.h>
const int MAX = 3;
int main ()
{
int var[] = {10, 100, 200};
int i, *ptr;
/* let us have address of the first element in pointer */
ptr = var;
i = 0;
while ( ptr <= &var[MAX - 1] )
{
printf("Address of var[%d] = %x\n", i, ptr );
printf("Value of var[%d] = %d\n", i, *ptr );
/* point to the previous location */
ptr++;
i++;
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and
executed, it produces result something as
follows:
Address of var[0] = bfdbcb20
Value of var[0] = 10
Address of var[1] = bfdbcb24
Value of var[1] = 100
Address of var[2] = bfdbcb28
Value of var[2] = 200
Array of pointers
Before we understand the concept of arrays of pointers, let us consider the following example,
which makes use of an array of 3 integers:
#include <stdio.h>
const int MAX = 3;
int main ()
{
int var[] = {10, 100, 200};
int i;
for (i = 0; i < MAX; i++)
{
printf("Value of var[%d] = %d\n", i, var[i] );
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Value of var[0] = 10
Value of var[1] = 100
Value of var[2] = 200
There may be a situation when we want to maintain an array, which can store pointers to an int or
char or any other data type available. Following is the declaration of an array of pointers to an
integer:
int *ptr[MAX];
This declares ptr as an array of MAX integer pointers. Thus, each element in ptr, now holds a
pointer to an int value. Following example makes use of three integers, which will be stored in an
array of pointers as follows:
#include <stdio.h>
const int MAX = 3;
int main ()
{
int var[] = {10, 100, 200};
int i, *ptr[MAX];
for ( i = 0; i < MAX; i++)
{
ptr[i] = &var[i]; /* assign the address of integer. */
}
for ( i = 0; i < MAX; i++)
{
printf("Value of var[%d] = %d\n", i, *ptr[i] );
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the
following result:
Value of var[0] = 10
Value of var[1] = 100
Value of var[2] = 200
You can also use an array of pointers to character to store a list of
strings as follows:
#include <stdio.h>
const int MAX = 4;
int main ()
{
char *names[] = {
"Zara Ali",
"Hina Ali",
"Nuha Ali",
"Sara Ali",
};
int i = 0;
for ( i = 0; i < MAX; i++)
{
printf("Value of names[%d] = %s\n", i, names[i] );
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the
following result:
Value of names[0] = Zara Ali
Value of names[1] = Hina Ali
Value of names[2] = Nuha Ali
Value of names[3] = Sara Ali
Pointer to Pointer
A pointer to a pointer is a form of multiple indirection, or a chain of pointers. Normally, a pointer
contains the address of a variable. When we define a pointer to a pointer, the first pointer contains
the address of the second pointer, which points to the location that contains the actual value as
shown below.

A variable that is a pointer to a pointer must be declared as such. This is done by placing an
additional asterisk in front of its name. For example, following is the declaration to declare a
pointer to a pointer of type int:
int **var;
When a target value is indirectly pointed to by a pointer to a pointer, accessing that value requires
that the asterisk operator be applied twice, as is shown below in the example:
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
int var;
int *ptr;
int **pptr;
var = 3000;
/* take the address of var */
ptr = &var;
/* take the address of ptr using address of operator & */
pptr = &ptr;
/* take the value using pptr */
printf("Value of var = %d\n", var );
printf("Value available at *ptr = %d\n", *ptr );
printf("Value available at **pptr = %d\n", **pptr);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Value of var = 3000
Value available at *ptr = 3000
Value available at **pptr = 3000
Passing pointers to functions
C programming language allows you to pass a pointer to a function. To do so, simply declare the
function parameter as a pointer type.
Following a simple example where we pass an unsigned long pointer to a function and change the
value inside the function which reflects back in the calling function:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <time.h>
void getSeconds(unsigned long *par);
int main ()
{
unsigned long sec;
getSeconds( &sec );
/* print the actual value */
printf("Number of seconds: %ld\n", sec );
return 0;
}
void getSeconds(unsigned long *par)
{
/* get the current number of seconds */
*par = time( NULL );
return;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Number of seconds :1294450468
The function, which can accept a pointer, can also accept an array as shown in the following
example:
#include <stdio.h>
/* function declaration */
double getAverage(int *arr, int size);
int main ()
{
/* an int array with 5 elements */
int balance[5] = {1000, 2, 3, 17, 50};
double avg;
/* pass pointer to the array as an argument */
avg = getAverage( balance, 5 ) ;
/* output the returned value */
printf("Average value is: %f\n", avg );
return 0;
}
double getAverage(int *arr, int size)
{
int i, sum = 0;
double avg;
for (i = 0; i < size; ++i)
{
sum += arr[i];
}
avg = (double)sum / size;
return avg;
}
When the above code is compiled together and executed, it produces the following result:
Average value is: 214.40000
Return pointer from functions
As we have seen in last chapter how C programming language allows to return an array from a
function, similar way C allows you to return a pointer from a function. To do so, you would have
to declare a function returning a pointer as in the following example:
int * myFunction()
{
.
.
.
}
Second point to remember is that, it is not good idea to return the address of a local variable to
outside of the function so you would have to define the local variable as static variable.
Now, consider the following function, which will generate 10 random numbers and returns them
using an array name which represents a pointer, i.e., address of first array element.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <time.h>
/* function to generate and retrun random numbers. */
int * getRandom( )
{
static int r[10];
int i;
/* set the seed */
srand( (unsigned)time( NULL ) );
for ( i = 0; i < 10; ++i)
{
r[i] = rand();
printf("%d\n", r[i] );
}
return r;
}
/* main function to call above defined function */
int main ()
{
/* a pointer to an int */
int *p;
int i;
p = getRandom();
for ( i = 0; i < 10; i++ )
{
printf("*(p + [%d]) : %d\n", i, *(p + i) );
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled together and executed, it produces result something as follows:
1523198053
1187214107
1108300978
430494959
1421301276
930971084
123250484
106932140
1604461820
149169022
*(p + [0]) : 1523198053
*(p + [1]) : 1187214107
*(p + [2]) : 1108300978
*(p + [3]) : 430494959
*(p + [4]) : 1421301276
*(p + [5]) : 930971084
*(p + [6]) : 123250484
*(p + [7]) : 106932140
*(p + [8]) : 1604461820
*(p + [9]) : 149169022
C Strings
The string in C programming language is actually a one-dimensional array of characters which is
terminated by a null character '\0'. Thus a null-terminated string contains the characters that
comprise the string followed by a null.
The following declaration and initialization create a string consisting of the word "Hello". To hold
the null character at the end of the array, the size of the character array containing the string is one
more than the number of characters in the word "Hello".
char greeting[6] = {'H', 'e', 'l', 'l', 'o', '\0'};
If you follow the rule of array initialization then you can write the above statement as follows:
char greeting[] = "Hello";
Following is the memory presentation of above-defined string in C/C++:

Actually, you do not place the null character at the end of a string constant. The C compiler
automatically places the '\0' at the end of the string when it initializes the array. Let us try to print
above mentioned string:
#include <stdio.h>
int main ()
{
char greeting[6] = {'H', 'e', 'l', 'l', 'o', '\0'};
printf("Greeting message: %s\n", greeting );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces result something as follows:
Greeting message: Hello
C supports a wide range of functions that manipulate null-terminated strings:

Following example makes use of few of the above-mentioned functions:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
int main ()
{
char str1[12] = "Hello";
char str2[12] = "World";
char str3[12];
int len ;
/* copy str1 into str3 */
strcpy(str3, str1);
printf("strcpy( str3, str1) : %s\n", str3 );
/* concatenates str1 and str2 */
strcat( str1, str2);
printf("strcat( str1, str2): %s\n", str1 );
/* total lenghth of str1 after concatenation */
len = strlen(str1);
printf("strlen(str1) : %d\n", len );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces result something as follows:
strcpy( str3, str1) : Hello
strcat( str1, str2): HelloWorld
strlen(str1) : 10
You can find a complete list of C string related functions in C Standard Library.
C Structures
C arrays allow you to define type of variables that can hold several data items of the same kind but
structure is another user defined data type available in C programming, which allows you to
combine data items of different kinds.
Structures are used to represent a record, suppose you want to keep track of your books in a library.
You might want to track the following attributes about each book:





Defining a Structure
To define a structure, you must use the struct statement. The struct statement defines a new data
type, with more than one member for your program. The format of the struct statement is this:
struct [structure tag]
{
member definition;
member definition;
...
member definition;
} [one or more structure variables];
The structure tag is optional and each member definition is a normal variable definition, such as int
i; or float f; or any other valid variable definition. At the end of the structure's definition, before the
final semicolon, you can specify one or more structure variables but it is optional. Here is the way
you would declare the Book structure:
struct Books
{
char title[50];
char author[50];
char subject[100];
int book_id;
} book;
Accessing StructureMembers
To access any member of a structure, we use the member access operator (.). The member access
operator is coded as a period between the structure variable name and the structure member that we
wish to access. You would use struct keyword to define variables of structure type. Following is
the example to explain usage of structure:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
struct Books
{
char title[50];
char author[50];
char subject[100];
int book_id;
};
int main( )
{
struct Books Book1; /* Declare Book1 of type Book */
struct Books Book2; /* Declare Book2 of type Book */
/* book 1 specification */
strcpy( Book1.title, "C Programming");
strcpy( Book1.author, "Nuha Ali");
strcpy( Book1.subject, "C Programming Tutorial");
Book1.book_id = 6495407;
/* book 2 specification */
strcpy( Book2.title, "Telecom Billing");
strcpy( Book2.author, "Zara Ali");
strcpy( Book2.subject, "Telecom Billing Tutorial");
Book2.book_id = 6495700;
/* print Book1 info */
printf( "Book 1 title : %s\n", Book1.title);
printf( "Book 1 author : %s\n", Book1.author);
printf( "Book 1 subject : %s\n", Book1.subject);
printf( "Book 1 book_id : %d\n", Book1.book_id);
/* print Book2 info */
printf( "Book 2 title : %s\n", Book2.title);
printf( "Book 2 author : %s\n", Book2.author);
printf( "Book 2 subject : %s\n", Book2.subject);
printf( "Book 2 book_id : %d\n", Book2.book_id);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Book 1 title : C Programming
Book 1 author : Nuha Ali
Book 1 subject : C Programming Tutorial
Book 1 book_id : 6495407
Book 2 title : Telecom Billing
Book 2 author : Zara Ali
Book 2 subject : Telecom Billing Tutorial
Book 2 book_id : 6495700
Structures as Function Arguments
You can pass a structure as a function argument in very similar way as you pass any other variable
or pointer. You would access structure variables in the similar way as you have accessed in the
above example:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
struct Books
{
char title[50];
char author[50];
char subject[100];
int book_id;
};
/* function declaration */
void printBook( struct Books book );
int main( )
{
struct Books Book1; /* Declare Book1 of type Book */
struct Books Book2; /* Declare Book2 of type Book */
/* book 1 specification */
strcpy( Book1.title, "C Programming");
strcpy( Book1.author, "Nuha Ali");
strcpy( Book1.subject, "C Programming Tutorial");
Book1.book_id = 6495407;
/* book 2 specification */
strcpy( Book2.title, "Telecom Billing");
strcpy( Book2.author, "Zara Ali");
strcpy( Book2.subject, "Telecom Billing Tutorial");
Book2.book_id = 6495700;
/* print Book1 info */
printBook( Book1 );
/* Print Book2 info */
printBook( Book2 );
return 0;
}
void printBook( struct Books book )
{
printf( "Book title : %s\n", book.title);
printf( "Book author : %s\n", book.author);
printf( "Book subject : %s\n", book.subject);
printf( "Book book_id : %d\n", book.book_id);
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Book title : C Programming
Book author : Nuha Ali
Book subject : C Programming Tutorial
Book book_id : 6495407
Book title : Telecom Billing
Book author : Zara Ali
Book subject : Telecom Billing Tutorial
Book book_id : 6495700
Pointers to Structures
You can define pointers to structures in very similar way as you define pointer to any other variable
as follows:
struct Books *struct_pointer;
Now, you can store the address of a structure variable in the above defined pointer variable. To find
the address of a structure variable, place the & operator before the structure's name as follows:
struct_pointer = &Book1;
To access the members of a structure using a pointer to that structure, you must use the ->
operator as follows:
struct_pointer->title;
Let us re-write above example using structure pointer, hope this will be easy for you to understand
the concept:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
struct Books
{
char title[50];
char author[50];
char subject[100];
int book_id;
};
/* function declaration */
void printBook( struct Books *book );
int main( )
{
struct Books Book1; /* Declare Book1 of type Book */
struct Books Book2; /* Declare Book2 of type Book */
/* book 1 specification */
strcpy( Book1.title, "C Programming");
strcpy( Book1.author, "Nuha Ali");
strcpy( Book1.subject, "C Programming Tutorial");
Book1.book_id = 6495407;
/* book 2 specification */
strcpy( Book2.title, "Telecom Billing");
strcpy( Book2.author, "Zara Ali");
strcpy( Book2.subject, "Telecom Billing Tutorial");
Book2.book_id = 6495700;
/* print Book1 info by passing address of Book1 */
printBook( &Book1 );
/* print Book2 info by passing address of Book2 */
printBook( &Book2 );
return 0;
}
void printBook( struct Books *book )
{
printf( "Book title : %s\n", book->title);
printf( "Book author : %s\n", book->author);
printf( "Book subject : %s\n", book->subject);
printf( "Book book_id : %d\n", book->book_id);
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Book title : C Programming
Book author : Nuha Ali
Book subject : C Programming Tutorial
Book book_id : 6495407
Book title : Telecom Billing
Book author : Zara Ali
Book subject : Telecom Billing Tutorial
Book book_id : 6495700
Typedef
The C programming language provides a keyword called typedef, which you can use to give a type
a new name. Following is an example to define a term BYTE for one-byte numbers:
typedef unsigned char BYTE;
After this type definitions, the identifier BYTE can be used as an abbreviation for the type
unsigned char, for example:
BYTE b1, b2;
By convention, uppercase letters are used for these definitions to remind the user that the type name
is really a symbolic abbreviation, but you can use lowercase, as follows:
typedef unsigned char byte;
You can use typedef to give a name to user defined data type as well. For example you can use
typedef with structure to define a new data type and then use that data type to define structure
variables directly as follows:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
typedef struct Books
{
char title[50];
char author[50];
char subject[100];
int book_id;
} Book;
int main( )
{
Book book;
strcpy( book.title, "C Programming");
strcpy( book.author, "Nuha Ali");
strcpy( book.subject, "C Programming Tutorial");
book.book_id = 6495407;
printf( "Book title : %s\n", book.title);
printf( "Book author : %s\n", book.author);
printf( "Book subject : %s\n", book.subject);
printf( "Book book_id : %d\n", book.book_id);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Book title : C Programming
Book author : Nuha Ali
Book subject : C Programming Tutorial
Book book_id : 6495407
typedef vs #define
The #define is a C-directive which is also used to define the aliases for various data types similar to
typedef but with three differences:
typedef is limited to giving symbolic names to types only where as #define can be used to
define alias for values as well, like you can define 1 as ONE etc.

typedef interpretation is performed by the compiler where as #define statements are
processed by the pre-processor.

Following is a simplest usage of #define:
#include <stdio.h>
#define TRUE 1
#define FALSE 0
int main( )
{
printf( "Value of TRUE : %d\n", TRUE);
printf( "Value of FALSE : %d\n", FALSE);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Value of TRUE : 1
Value of FALSE : 0
Input & Output
When we are saying Input that means to feed some data into program. This can be given in the
form of file or from command line. C programming language provides a set of built-in functions to
read given input and feed it to the program as per requirement.
When we are saying Output that means to display some data on screen, printer or in any file. C
programming language provides a set of built-in functions to output the data on the computer
screen as well as you can save that data in text or binary files.
The Standard Files
C programming language treats all the devices as files. So devices such as the display are addressed
in the same way as files and following three file are automatically opened when a program executes
to provide access to the keyboard and screen.

The file points are the means to access the file for reading and writing purpose. This section will
explain you how to read values from the screen and how to print the result on the screen.
The getchar() & putchar() functions
The int getchar(void) function reads the next available character from the screen and returns it as an
integer. This function reads only single character at a time. You can use this method in the loop in
case you want to read more than one characters from the screen.
The int putchar(int c) function puts the passed character on the screen and returns the same
character. This function puts only single character at a time. You can use this method
in the loop in case you want to display more than one character on the screen. Check the following
example:
#include <stdio.h>
int main( )
{
int c;
printf( "Enter a value :");
c = getchar( );
printf( "\nYou entered: ");
putchar( c );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it waits for you to input some text when you enter
a text and press enter then program proceeds and reads only a single character and displays it as
follows:
$./a.out
Enter a value : this is test
You entered: t
The gets() & puts() functions
The char *gets(char *s) function reads a line from stdin into the buffer pointed to by s until either a
terminating newline or EOF.
The int puts(const char *s) function writes the string s and a trailing newline to stdout.
#include <stdio.h>
int main( )
{
char str[100];
printf( "Enter a value :");
str = gets( str );
printf( "\nYou entered: ");
puts( str );
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it waits for you to input some text when you enter
a text and press enter then program proceeds and reads the complete line till end and displays it as
follows:
$./a.out
Enter a value : this is test
You entered: This is test
The scanf() and printf() functions
The int scanf(const char *format, ...) function reads input from the standard input stream stdin and
scans that input according to format provided.
The int printf(const char *format, ...) function writes output to the standard output stream stdout
and produces output according to a format provided.
The format can be a simple constant string, but you can specify %s, %d, %c, %f, etc., to print or
read strings, integer, character or float respectively. There are many other formatting options
available which can be used based on requirements. For a complete detail you can refer to a man
page for these function. For now let us proceed with a simple example which makes things clear:
#include <stdio.h>
int main( )
{
char str[100];
int i;
printf( "Enter a value :");
scanf("%s %d", str, &i);
printf( "\nYou entered: %s, %d ", str, i);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it waits for you to input some text when you enter
a text and press enter then program proceeds and reads the input and displays it as follows:
$./a.out
Enter a value : seven 7
You entered: seven 7
Here, it should be noted that scanf() expect input in the same format as you provided %s and %d,
which means you have to provide valid input like "string integer", if you provide "string string" or
"integer integer" then it will be assumed as wrong input. Second, while reading a string scanf()
stops reading as soon as it encounters a space so "this is test" are three strings for scanf().
File I/O
Last chapter explained about standard input and output devices handled by C programming
language. This chapter we will see how C programmers can create, open, close text or binary files
for their data storage.
A file represents a sequence of bytes, does not matter if it is a text file or binary file. C
programming language provides access on high level functions as well as low level (OS level) calls
to handle file on your storage devices. This chapter will take you through important calls for the
file management.
Opening Files
You can use the fopen( ) function to create a new file or to open an existing file, this call will
initialize an object of the type FILE, which contains all the information necessary to control the
stream. Following is the prototype of this function call:
FILE *fopen( const char * filename, const char * mode );
Here, filename is string litera
l, which you will use to name your file and access mode can have one of the following values:

If you are going to handle binary files then you will use below mentioned access modes instead of
the above mentioned:
"rb", "wb", "ab", "ab+", "a+b", "wb+", "w+b", "ab+", "a+b"
Closing a File
To close a file, use the fclose( ) function. The prototype of this function is:
int fclose( FILE *fp );
The fclose( ) function returns zero on success, or EOF if there is an error in closing the file. This
function actually, flushes any data still pending in the buffer to the file, closes the file, and releases
any memory used for the file. The EOF is a constant defined in the header file stdio.h.
There are various functions provide by C standard library to read and write a file character by
character or in the form of a fixed length string. Let us see few of the in the next section.
Writing a File
Following is the simplest function to write individual characters to a stream:
int fputc( int c, FILE *fp );
The function fputc() writes the character value of the argument c to the output stream referenced by
fp. It returns the written character written on success otherwise EOF if there is an error. You can
use the following functions to write a null-terminated string to a stream:
int fputs( const char *s, FILE *fp );
The function fputs() writes the string s to the output stream referenced by fp. It returns a non-
negative value on success, otherwise EOF is returned in case of any error. You can use int
fprintf(FILE *fp,const char *format, ...) function as well to write a string into a file. Try the
following example:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
FILE *fp;
fp = fopen("/tmp/test.txt", "w+");
fprintf(fp, "This is testing for fprintf...\n");
fputs("This is testing for fputs...\n", fp);
fclose(fp);
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it creates a new file test.txt in /tmp directory and
writes two lines using two different functions. Let us read this file in next section.
Reading a File
Following is the simplest function to read a single character from a file:
int fgetc( FILE * fp );
The fgetc() function reads a character from the input file referenced by fp. The return value is the
character read, or in case of any error it returns EOF. The following functions allow you to read a
string from a stream:
char *fgets( char *buf, int n, FILE *fp );
The functions fgets() reads up to n - 1 characters from the input stream referenced by fp. It copies
the read string into the buffer buf, appending a null character to terminate the string.
If this function encounters a newline character '\n' or the end of the file EOF before they have read
the maximum number of characters, then it returns only the characters read up to that point
including new line character. You can also use int fscanf(FILE *fp, const char *format, ...) function
to read strings from a file but it stops reading after the first space character encounters.
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
FILE *fp;
char buff[100];
fp = fopen("/tmp/test.txt", "r");
fscanf(fp, "%s", buff);
printf("1 : %s\n", buff );
fgets(buff, 255, (FILE*)fp);
printf("2: %s\n", buff );
fgets(buff, 255, (FILE*)fp);
printf("3: %s\n", buff );
fclose(fp);
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it reads the file created in previous section and
produces the following result:
1 : This
2: is testing for fprintf...
3: This is testing for fputs...
Let's see a little more detail about what happened here. First fscanf() method read just This because
after that it encountered a space, second call is for fgets() which read the remaining line till it
encountered end of line. Finally last call fgets() read second line completely.
Binary I/O Functions
There are following two functions, which can be used for binary input and output:
size_t fread(void *ptr, size_t size_of_elements,
size_t number_of_elements, FILE *a_file);
size_t fwrite(const void *ptr, size_t size_of_elements,
size_t number_of_elements, FILE *a_file);
Both of these functions should be used to read or write blocks of memories - usually arrays or
structures.
Preprocessors
The C Preprocessor is not part of the compiler, but is a separate step in the compilation process. In
simplistic terms, a C Preprocessor is just a text substitution tool and they instruct compiler to do
required pre-processing before actual compilation. We'll refer to the C Preprocessor as the CPP.
All preprocessor commands begin with a pound symbol (#). It must be the first nonblank character,
and for readability, a preprocessor directive should begin in first column. Following section lists
down all important preprocessor directives:

Preprocessors Examples
Analyze following examples to understand various directives.
#define MAX_ARRAY_LENGTH 20
This directive tells the CPP to replace instances of MAX_ARRAY_LENGTH with 20. Use #define
for constants to increase readability.
#include <stdio.h>
#include "myheader.h"
These directives tell the CPP to get stdio.h from System Libraries and add the text to the current
source file. The next line tells CPP to get myheader.h from the local directory and add the content
to the current source file.
#undef FILE_SIZE
#define FILE_SIZE 42
This tells the CPP to undefine existing FILE_SIZE and define it as 42.
#ifndef MESSAGE
#define MESSAGE "You wish!"
#endif
This tells the CPP to define MESSAGE only if MESSAGE isn't already defined.
#ifdef DEBUG
/* Your debugging statements here */
#endif
This tells the CPP to do the process the statements enclosed if DEBUG is defined. This is useful if
you pass the -DDEBUG flag to gcc compiler at the time of compilation. This will define DEBUG,
so you can turn debugging on and off on the fly during compilation.
Predefined Macros
ANSI C defines a number of macros. Although each one is available for your use in programming,
the predefined macros should not be directly modified.

Let's try the following example:
#include <stdio.h>
main()

{
printf("File :%s\n", __FILE__ );
printf("Date :%s\n", __DATE__ );
printf("Time :%s\n", __TIME__ );
printf("Line :%d\n", __LINE__ );
printf("ANSI :%d\n", __STDC__ );
}
When the above code in a file test.c is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
File :test.c
Date :Jun 2 2012
Time :03:36:24
Line :8
ANSI :1
Preprocessor Operators
The C preprocessor offers following operators to help you in creating macros:
Macro Continuation (\)
A macro usually must be contained on a single line. The macro continuation operator is used to
continue a macro that is too long for a single line. For example:
#define message_for(a, b) \
printf(#a " and " #b ": We love you!\n")
Stringize (#)
The stringize or number-sign operator ('#'), when used within a macro definition, converts a macro
parameter into a string constant. This operator may be used only in a macro that has a specified
argument or parameter list. For example:
#include <stdio.h>
#define message_for(a, b) \
printf(#a " and " #b ": We love you!\n")
int main(void)
{
message_for(Carole, Debra);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
token34 = 40
How it happened, because this example results in the following actual output from the
preprocessor:
printf ("token34 = %d", token34);
This example shows the concatenation of token##n into token34 and here we have used both
stringize and token-pasting.
The defined() Operator
The preprocessor defined operator is used in constant expressions to determine if an identifier is
defined using #define. If the specified identifier is defined, the value is true (non-zero). If the
symbol is not defined, the value is false (zero). The defined operator is specified as follows:
#include <stdio.h>
#if !defined (MESSAGE)
#define MESSAGE "You wish!"
#endif
int main(void)
{
printf("Here is the message: %s\n", MESSAGE);
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Here is the message: You wish!
Parameterized Macros
One of the powerful functions of the CPP is the ability to simulate functions using parameterized
macros. For example, we might have some code to square a number as follows:
int square(int x) {
return x * x;
}
We can rewrite above code using a macro as follows:
#define square(x) ((x) * (x))
Macros with arguments must be defined using the #define directive before they can be used. The
argument list is enclosed in parentheses and must immediately follow the macro name. Spaces are
not allowed between and macro name and open parenthesis. For example:
#include <stdio.h>
#define MAX(x,y) ((x) > (y) ? (x) : (y))
int main(void)
{
printf("Max between 20 and 10 is %d\n", MAX(10, 20));
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Max between 20 and 10 is 20
Header Files
A header file is a file with extension .h which contains C function declarations and macro
definitions and to be shared between several source files. There are two types of header files: the
files that the programmer writes and the files that come with your compiler.
You request the use of a header file in your program by including it, with the C preprocessing
directive #include like you have seen inclusion of stdio.h header file. which comes along with your
compiler.
Including a header file is equal to copying the content of the header file but we do not do it because
it will be very much error-prone and it is not a good idea to copy the content of header file in the
source files, specially if we have multiple source file comprising our program.
A simple practice in C or C++ programs is that we keep all the constants, macros, system wide
global variables, and function prototypes in header files and include that header file wherever it is
required.
The functions, types and macros of the standard library are declared in standard headers:
<assert.h> <float.h> <math.h> <stdarg.h> <stdlib.h>
<ctype.h> <limits.h> <setjmp.h> <stddef.h> <string.h>
<errno.h> <locale.h> <signal.h> <stdio.h> <time.h>
A header can be accessed by
#include <header>
Headers may be included in any order and any number of times. A header must be included outside
of
any external declaration or definition and before any use of anything it declares. A header need not
be a
source file.
External identifiers that begin with an underscore are reserved for use by the library, as are all other
identifiers that begin with an underscore and an upper-case letter or another underscore.
Input and Output: <stdio.h>
The input and output functions, types, and macros defined in <stdio.h> represent nearly one third of
the library.
Character Class Tests: <ctype.h>
The header <ctype.h> declares functions for testing characters. For each function, the argument list
is
an int, whose value must be EOF or representable as an unsigned char, and the return value is an
int. The functions return non-zero (true) if the argument c satisfies the condition described, and
zero if
not.
String Functions: <string.h>
There are two groups of string functions defined in the header <string.h>. The first have names
beginning with str; the second have names beginning with mem. Except for memmove, the
behavior is
undefined if copying takes place between overlapping objects. Comparison functions treat
arguments as
unsigned char arrays.

Mathematical Functions: <math.h>
The header <math.h> declares mathematical functions and macros.

Utility Functions: <stdlib.h>
The header <stdlib.h> declares functions for number conversion, storage allocation, and similar
tasks.

Diagnostics: <assert.h>
The assert macro is used to add diagnostics to programs:

Variable Argument Lists: <stdarg.h>
The header <stdarg.h> provides facilities for stepping through a list of function arguments of
unknown number and type.

Non-local Jumps: <setjmp.h>
The declarations in <setjmp.h> provide a way to avoid the normal function call and return
sequence,
typically to permit an immediate return from a deeply nested function call.

Signals: <signal.h>

The header <signal.h> provides facilities for handling exceptional conditions that arise during
execution, such as an interrupt signal from an external source or an error in execution.
Date and Time Functions: <time.h>
The header <time.h> declares types and functions for manipulating date and time. Some functions
process local time, which may differ from calendar time, for example because of time zone. clock_t
and time_t are arithmetic types representing times, and struct tm holds the components of a
calendar time:

Implementation-defined Limits: <limits.h> and
<float.h>
The header <limits.h> defines constants for the sizes of integral types
<float.h>, are constants related to floating-point arithmetic
Include Syntax
Both user and system header files are included using the preprocessing directive #include. It has
following two forms:
#include <file>
This form is used for system header files. It searches for a file named file in a standard list of
system directories. You can prepend directories to this list with the -I option while compiling your
source code.
#include "file"
This form is used for header files of your own program. It searches for a file named file in the
directory containing the current file. You can prepend directories to this list with the -I option while
compiling your source code.
Include Operation
The #include directive works by directing the C preprocessor to scan the specified file as input
before continuing with the rest of the current source file. The output from the preprocessor contains
the output already generated, followed by the output resulting from the included file, followed by
the output that comes from the text after the #include directive. For example, if you have a header
file header.h as follows:
char *test (void);
and a main program called program.c that uses the header file, like this:
int x;
#include "header.h"
int main (void)
{
puts (test ());
}
the compiler will see the same token stream as it would if program.c read
int x;
char *test (void);
int main (void)
{
puts (test ());
}
Once-Only Headers
If a header file happens to be included twice, the compiler will process its contents twice and will
result an error. The standard way to prevent this is to enclose the entire real contents of the file in a
conditional, like this:
#ifndef HEADER_FILE
#define HEADER_FILE
the entire header file file
#endif
This construct is commonly known as a wrapper #ifndef. When the header is included again, the
conditional will be false, because HEADER_FILE is defined. The preprocessor will skip over the
entire contents of the file, and the compiler will not see it twice.
Computed Includes
Sometimes it is necessary to select one of several different header files to be included into your
program. They might specify configuration parameters to be used on different sorts of operating
systems, for instance. You could do this with a series of conditionals as follows:
#if SYSTEM_1
# include "system_1.h"
#elif SYSTEM_2
# include "system_2.h"
#elif SYSTEM_3
...
#endif
But as it grows, it becomes tedious, instead the preprocessor offers the ability to use a macro for the
header name. This is called a computed include. Instead of writing a header name as the direct
argument of #include, you simply put a macro name there instead:
#define SYSTEM_H "system_1.h"
...
#include SYSTEM_H
SYSTEM_H will be expanded, and the preprocessor will look for system_1.h as if the #include had
been written that way originally. SYSTEM_H could be defined by your Makefile with a -D option.
Type Casting
Type casting is a way to convert a variable from one data type to another data type. For example, if
you want to store a long value into a simple integer then you can type cast long to int. You can
convert values from one type to another explicitly using the cast operator as follows:
(type_name) expression
Consider the following example where the cast operator causes the division of one integer variable
by another to be performed as a floating-point operation:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int sum = 17, count = 5;
double mean;
mean = (double) sum / count;
printf("Value of mean : %f\n", mean );
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Value of mean : 3.400000
It should be noted here that the cast operator has precedence over division, so the value of sum is
first converted to type double and finally it gets divided by count yielding a double value.
Type conversions can be implicit which is performed by the compiler automatically, or it can be
specified explicitly through the use of the cast operator. It is considered good programming practice
to use the cast operator whenever type conversions are necessary.
Integer Promotion
The Integer promotion is the process by which values of integer type "smaller" than int or
unsigned int are converted either to int or unsigned int. Consider an example of adding a
character in an int:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int i = 17;
char c = 'c'; /* ascii value is 99 */
int sum;
sum = i + c;
printf("Value of sum : %d\n", sum );
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Value of sum : 116
Here, value of sum is coming as 116 because compiler is doing integer promotion and converting
the value of 'c' to ascii before performing actual addition operation.
Usual Arithmetic Conversion
The usual arithmetic conversions are implicitly performed to cast their values in a common type.
Compiler first performs integer promotion, if operands still have different types then they are
converted to the type that appears highest in the following hierarchy:

The usual arithmetic conversions are not performed for the assignment operators, nor for the logical
operators && and ||. Let us take following example to understand the concept:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int i = 17;
char c = 'c'; /* ascii value is 99 */
float sum;
sum = i + c;
printf("Value of sum : %f\n", sum );
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Value of sum : 116.000000
Here, it is simple to understand that first c gets converted to integer but because final value is
double, so usual arithmetic conversion applies and compiler convert i and c into float and add them
yielding a float result.
Error Handling
As such C programming does not provide direct support for error handling but being a system
programming language, it provides you access at lower level in the form of return values. Most of
the C or even Unix function calls return -1 or NULL in case of any error and sets an error code
errno is set which is global variable and indicates an error occurred during any function call. You
can find various error codes defined in <error.h> header file.
So a C programmer can check the returned values and can take appropriate action depending on the
return value. As a good practice, developer should set errno to 0 at the time of initialization of the
program. A value of 0 indicates that there is no error in the program.
The errno, perror() and strerror()
The C programming language provides perror() and strerror() functions which can be used to
display the text message associated with errno.
perror() function displays the string you pass to it, followed by a colon, a space, and then
the textual representation of the current errno value.

strerror() function, which returns a pointer to the textual representation of the current errno
value.

Let's try to simulate an error condition and try to open a file which does not exist. Here I'm using
both the functions to show the usage, but you can use one or more ways of printing your errors.
Second important point to note is that you should use stderr file stream to output all the errors.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <errno.h>
#include <string.h>
extern int errno ;
int main ()
{
FILE * pf;
int errnum;
if (pf == NULL)
{
errnum = errno;
fprintf(stderr, "Value of errno: %d\n", errno);
perror("Error printed by perror");
fprintf(stderr, "Error opening file: %s\n", strerror( errnum ));
}
else
{
fclose (pf);
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Value of errno: 2
Error printed by perror: No such file or directory
Error opening file: No such file or directory
Divide by zero errors
It is a common problem that at the time of dividing any number, programmers do not check if a
divisor is zero and finally it creates a runtime error.
The code below fixes this by checking if the divisor is zero before dividing:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
main()
{
int dividend = 20;
int divisor = 0;
int quotient;
if( divisor == 0){
fprintf(stderr, "Division by zero! Exiting...\n");
exit(-1);
}
quotient = dividend / divisor;
fprintf(stderr, "Value of quotient : %d\n", quotient );
exit(0);
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Division by zero! Exiting...
Program Exit Status
It is a common practice to exit with a value of EXIT_SUCCESS in case of programming is
coming out after a successful operation. Here, EXIT_SUCCESS is a macro and it is defined as 0.
If you have an error condition in your program and you are coming out then you should exit with a
status EXIT_FAILURE which is defined as -1. So let's write above program as follows:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
main()
{
int dividend = 20;
int divisor = 5;
int quotient;
if( divisor == 0){
fprintf(stderr, "Division by zero! Exiting...\n");
exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
}
quotient = dividend / divisor;
fprintf(stderr, "Value of quotient : %d\n", quotient );
exit(EXIT_SUCCESS);
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:
Value of quotient : 4
Recursion
Recursion is the process of repeating items in a self-similar way. Same applies in programming
languages as well where if a programming allows you to call a function inside the same function
that is called recursive call of the function as follows.
void recursion()
{
recursion(); /* function calls itself */
}
int main()
{
recursion();
}
The C programming language supports recursion, i.e., a function to call itself. But while using
recursion, programmers need to be careful to define an exit condition from the function, otherwise
it will go in infinite loop.
Recursive function are very useful to solve many mathematical problems like to calculate factorial
of a number, generating Fibonacci series, etc.
Number Factorial
Following is an example, which calculates factorial for a given number using a recursive function:
#include <stdio.h>
int factorial(unsigned int i)
{
if(i <= 1)
{
return 1;
}
return i * factorial(i - 1);
}
int main()
{
i
n
t
i
=

1
5
;
p
r
i
n
t
f
(
"
F
a
c
t
o
r
i
a
l
o
f
%
d

i
s
%
d
\
n
"
,
i
,
f
a
c
t
o
rial(i));
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces
the following result:
Factorial of 15 is 2004310016
Fibonacci Series
Following is another example, which generates Fibonacci
series for a given number using a recursive function:
#include <stdio.h>
int fibonaci(int i)
{
if(i == 0)
{
return 0;
}
if(i == 1)
{
return 1;
}
return fibonaci(i-1) + fibonaci(i-2);
}
int main()
{
int i;
for (i = 0; i < 10; i++)
{
printf("%d\t%n", fibonaci(i));
}
return 0;
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result:

Variable Arguments
Sometimes, you may come across a situation, when you want to have a function, which can take
variable number of arguments, i.e., parameters, instead of predefined number of parameters. The C
programming language provides a solution for this situation and you are allowed to define a
function which can accept variable number of parameters based on your requirement. The
following example shows the definition of such a function.
int func(int, ... )
{
.
.
.
}
int main()
{
func(1, 2, 3);
func(1, 2, 3, 4);
}
It should be noted that function func() has last argument as ellipses i.e. three dotes (...) and the one
just before the ellipses is always an int which will represent total number variable arguments
passed. To use such functionality you need to make use of stdarg.h header file which provides
functions and macros to implement the functionality of variable arguments and follow the
following steps:
int which will represent number of arguments.
va_list type variable in the function definition. This type is defined in stdarg.h header
file.
int parameter and va_start macro to initialize the va_list variable to an argument list. The
macro va_start is defined in stdarg.h header file.
va_arg macro and va_list variable to access each item in argument list.
va_end to clean up the memory assigned to va_list variable.

Now let us follow the above steps and write down a simple function which can take variable
number of parameters and returns their average:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdarg.h>
double average(int num,...)
{
va_list valist;
double sum = 0.0;
int i;
/* initialize valist for num number of arguments */
va_start(valist, num);
/* access all the arguments assigned to valist */
for (i = 0; i < num; i++)
{
sum += va_arg(valist, int);
}
/* clean memory reserved for valist */
va_end(valist);
return sum/num;
}
int main()
{
printf("Average of 2, 3, 4, 5 = %f\n", average(4, 2,3,4,5));
printf("Average of 5, 10, 15 = %f\n", average(3, 5,10,15));
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result. It should be noted
that the function average() has been called twice and each time first argument represents the total
number of variable arguments being passed. Only ellipses will be used to pass variable number of
arguments.
Average of 2, 3, 4, 5 = 3.500000
Average of 5, 10, 15 = 10.000000
Memory Management
This chapter will explain dynamic memory management in C. The C programming language
provides several functions for memory allocation and management. These functions can be found
in the<stdlib.h> header file.

Allocating Memory Dynamically
While doing programming, if you are aware about the size of an array, then it is easy and you can
define it as an array. For example to store a name of any person, it can go max 100 characters so
you can define something as follows:
char name[100];
But now let us consider a situation where you have no idea about the length of the text you need to
store, for example you want to store a detailed description about a topic. Here we need to define a
pointer to character without defining how much memory is required and later based on requirement
we can allocate memory as shown in the below example:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>
int main()
{
char name[100];
char *description;
strcpy(name, "Zara Ali");
/* allocate memory dynamically */
description = malloc( 200 * sizeof(char) );
if( description == NULL )
{
fprintf(stderr, "Error - unable to allocate required memory\n");
}
else
{
strcpy( description, "Zara ali a DPS student in class 10th");
}
printf("Name = %s\n", name );
printf("Description: %s\n", description );
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result.
Name = Zara Ali
Description: Zara ali a DPS student in class 10th
Same program can be written using calloc() only thing you need to replace malloc with calloc as
follows:
calloc(200, sizeof(char));
So you have complete control and you can pass any size value while allocating memory unlike
arrays where once you defined the size can not be changed.
Resizing and Releasing Memory
When your program comes out, operating system automatically release all the memory allocated by
your program but as a good practice when you are not in need of memory anymore then you should
release that memory by calling the function free().
Alternatively, you can increase or decrease the size of an allocated memory block by calling the
functionrealloc(). Let us check the above program once again and make use of realloc() and free()
functions:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>
int main()
{
char name[100];
char *description;
strcpy(name, "Zara Ali");
/* allocate memory dynamically */
description = malloc( 30 * sizeof(char) );
if( description == NULL )
{
fprintf(stderr, "Error - unable to allocate required memory\n");
}
else
{
strcpy( description, "Zara ali a DPS student.");
}
/* suppose you want to store bigger description */
description = realloc( description, 100 * sizeof(char) );
if( description == NULL )
{
fprintf(stderr, "Error - unable to allocate required memory\n");
}
else
{
strcat( description, "She is in class 10th");
}
printf("Name = %s\n", name );
printf("Description: %s\n", description );
/* release memory using free() function */
free(description);
}
When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result.
Name = Zara Ali
Description: Zara ali a DPS student.She is in class 10th
You can try above example without re-allocating extra memory and strcat() function will give an
error due to lack of available memory in description.
Command Line Arguments
It is possible to pass some values from the command line to your C programs when they are
executed. These values are called command line arguments and many times they are important for
your program specially when you want to control your program from outside instead of hard coding
those values inside the code.
The command line arguments are handled using main() function arguments where argc refers to the
number of arguments passed, and argv[] is a pointer array which points to each argument passed to
the program. Following is a simple example which checks if there is any argument supplied from
the command line and take action accordingly:
#include <stdio.h>
int main( int argc, char *argv[] )
{
if( argc == 2 )
{
printf("The argument supplied is %s\n", argv[1]);
}
else if( argc > 2 )
{
printf("Too many arguments supplied.\n");
}
else
{
printf("One argument expected.\n");
}
}
When the above code is compiled and executed with a single argument, it produces the following
result.
$./a.out testing
The argument supplied is testing
When the above code is compiled and executed with a two arguments, it produces the following
result.
$./a.out testing1 testing2
Too many arguments supplied.
When the above code is compiled and executed without passing any argument, it produces the
following result.
$./a.out
One argument expected
It should be noted that argv[0] holds the name of the program itself and argv[1] is a pointer to the
first command line argument supplied, and *argv[n] is the last argument. If no arguments are
supplied, argc will be one, otherwise and if you pass one argument then argc is set at 2.
You pass all the command line arguments separated by a space, but if argument itself has a space
then you can pass such arguments by putting them inside double quotes "" or single quotes ''. Let us
re-write above example once again where we will print program name and we also pass a command
line argument by putting inside double quotes:
#include <stdio.h>
int main( int argc, char *argv[] )
{
printf("Program name %s\n", argv[0]);
if( argc == 2 )
{
printf("The argument supplied is %s\n", argv[1]);
}
else if( argc > 2 )
{
printf("Too many arguments supplied.\n");
}
else
{
printf("One argument expected.\n");
}
}
When the above code is compiled and executed with a single argument separated by space but inside
double quotes, it produces the following result.
$./a.out "testing1 testing2"
Progranm name ./a.out
The argument supplied is testing1 testing2