C Programming For Dummies by Dan Gookin (US edition, paperback) - 9781119740247

Get an A grade in C As with any major language, mastery of C can take you to some very interesting new places. Almost 50 years after it first appeared, it's still the world's most popular programming language and is used as the basis of global industry's core systems, including operating systems, high-performance graphics applications, and microcontrollers. This means that fluent C users are in big demand at the sharp end in cutting-edge industries—such as gaming, app development, telecommunications, engineering, and even animation—to translate innovative ideas into a smoothly functioning reality. To help you get to where you want to go with C, this 2nd edition of C Programming For Dummies covers everything you need to begin writing programs, guiding you logically through the development cycle: from initial design and testing to deployment and live iteration. By the end you'll be au fait with the do's and don'ts of good clean writing and easily able to produce the basic—and not-so-basic—building blocks of an elegant and efficient source code. Write and compile source code Link code to create the executable program Debug and optimize your code Avoid common mistakes Whatever your destination: tech industry, start-up, or just developing for pleasure at home, this easy-to-follow, informative, and entertaining guide to the C programming language is the fastest and friendliest way to get there!Table of Content Introduction 1 Why the C Language? 1 The C Programming For Dummies Approach 2 How This Book Works 3 Icons Used in This Book 4 Parting Thoughts 5 Part 1: The ABs of C 7 Chapter 1: A Quick Start for the Impatient 9 What You Need to Program 9 Command Prompt Programming 10 IDE Programming 11 Installing Code::Blocks 12 Touring the Code::Blocks workspace 13 Your First Program 14 Coding at the command prompt 15 Building a new Code::Blocks project 16 Building and running 18 Chapter 2: The Programming Thing 21 The History of Programming 21 Reviewing early programming history 21 Introducing the C language 22 The Programming Process 23 Understanding programming 23 Writing source code 24 Compiling and linking 26 Running and testing 27 Chapter 3: Anatomy of C 29 Parts of the C Language 29 Keywords 30 Functions 31 Operators 33 Variables and values 33 Statements and structure 33 Comments 35 Behold the Typical C Program 37 Understanding C program structure 37 Setting the main() function 38 Returning something to the operating system 39 Adding a function 40 Part 2: C Programming 101 43 Chapter 4: Trials and Errors 45 Display Stuff on the Screen 45 Displaying a humorous message 45 Introducing the puts() function 46 Adding more text 47 Commenting out a statement 49 Goofing up on purpose 49 More Text Output Nonsense 51 Displaying text with pri