The History of Computer Science: C

Out of all the CS classes I’ve taken, the one that I’ve learned most about the history of programming from is my class in C.  Unlike Java, the low-level nature of C allows you to understand what’s happening behind the scenes (memory allocation, etc).  Coding in C is a little bit of a blast from the past, where you can just imagine typing away at a tiny, old, green and black screen.  Today, the language is the most widely used in the world, which is amazing since it was developed in 1972 (yes, that’s almost 41 years ago).

Dennis Ritchie developed C as part of Bell Laboratories in New Jersey.  Many of the key principles C were originated from the BCPL, an earlier language by Martin Richards.  C was also heavily influenced by B (by Ken Thomson in 1970), hence the name.  (A Brief History of C)   However, C improved on B by providing data types (where B was a typeless language). (Ritchie, The Development of the C Language)

In 1978, Brian Kernighan joined Ritchie to write a book called “The C Programming Language,” but programmers know it simply as “K&R.”  To this day, it is the unofficial specification of C.  It was my required text for my C class last semester.

C is so popular because it is portable and has simple syntax, but it still gives the user access to low-level information. (The C Programming Language)  This makes it a great teaching tool.  Everyone should learn some C, as most of the languages we use today borrow from it, including C#, Java, JavaScript, Objective-C, Perl, Python, and obviously C++.

C is the most influential programing language ever.  Even with its usage declining, it is likely to be around for a long time, and its descendants will be around forever.