Beginning Programming with C For Dummies

459 Pages·2014·34.941 MB·English

by  Dan Gookin

Beginning
Programming with C

Beginning
Programming with C
by Dan Gookin
Beginning Programming with C For Dummies®
Published by
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
111 River Street
Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774
www.wiley.com
Copyright © 2014 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey
Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey
Published simultaneously in Canada
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or
by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permit-
ted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written
permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the
Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], fax [phone].
Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department,
John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], or online
at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions.
Trademarks: Wiley, the Wiley logo, For Dummies, the Dummies Man logo, A Reference for the Rest of Us!,
The Dummies Way, Dummies Daily, The Fun and Easy Way, Dummies.com, Making Everything Easier, and
related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and/or its affiliates
in the United States and other countries, and may not be used without written permission. All other
trademarks are the property of their respective owners. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., is not associated with
any product or vendor mentioned in this book.
LIMIT OF LIABILITY/DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY: THE PUBLISHER AND THE AUTHOR MAKE NO
REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES WITH RESPECT TO THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS
OF THE CONTENTS OF THIS WORK AND SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, INCLUDING
WITHOUT LIMITATION WARRANTIES OF FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. NO WARRANTY
MAY BE CREATED OR EXTENDED BY SALES OR PROMOTIONAL MATERIALS. THE ADVICE AND
STRATEGIES CONTAINED HEREIN MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR EVERY SITUATION. THIS WORK IS
SOLD WITH THE UNDERSTANDING THAT THE PUBLISHER IS NOT ENGAGED IN RENDERING LEGAL,
ACCOUNTING, OR OTHER PROFESSIONAL SERVICES. IF PROFESSIONAL ASSISTANCE IS REQUIRED,
THE SERVICES OF A COMPETENT PROFESSIONAL PERSON SHOULD BE SOUGHT. NEITHER THE
PUBLISHER NOR THE AUTHOR SHALL BE LIABLE FOR DAMAGES ARISING HEREFROM. THE FACT
THAT AN ORGANIZATION OR WEBSITE IS REFERRED TO IN THIS WORK AS A CITATION AND/OR
A POTENTIAL SOURCE OF FURTHER INFORMATION DOES NOT MEAN THAT THE AUTHOR OR THE
PUBLISHER ENDORSES THE INFORMATION THE ORGANIZATION OR WEBSITE MAY PROVIDE OR
RECOMMENDATIONS IT MAY MAKE. FURTHER, READERS SHOULD BE AWARE THAT INTERNET
WEBSITES LISTED IN THIS WORK MAY HAVE CHANGED OR DISAPPEARED BETWEEN WHEN THIS
WORK WAS WRITTEN AND WHEN IT IS READ.
For general information on our other products and services, please contact our Customer Care
Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax [phone].
For technical support, please visit www.wiley.com/techsupport.
Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Not all content
that is available in standard print versions of this book may appear or be packaged in all book formats. If
you have purchased a version of this book that did not include media that is referenced by or accompanies
a standard print version, you may request this media by visiting http://booksupport.wiley.com. For
more information about Wiley products, visit us at www.wiley.com.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2013948031
ISBN 978-1-118-73763-7 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-118-73765-1 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-73762-0 (ebk)
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents at a Glance
Introduction ................................................................ 1
Part I: Getting Started with C Programming................... 7
Chapter 1: A Quick Start for the Impatient .....................................................................9
Chapter 2: The Programming Thing ..............................................................................21
Chapter 3: Anatomy of C .................................................................................................31
Part II: C Programming 101 ....................................... 45
Chapter 4: Trials and Errors ...........................................................................................47
Chapter 5: Values and Constants ...................................................................................59
Chapter 6: A Place to Put Stuff .......................................................................................71
Chapter 7: Input and Output ..........................................................................................83
Chapter 8: Decision Making ............................................................................................97
Chapter 9: Loops, Loops, Loops ..................................................................................113
Chapter 10: Fun with Functions ...................................................................................129
Part III: Build Upon What You Know ......................... 143
Chapter 11: The Unavoidable Math Chapter ..............................................................145
Chapter 12: Give Me Arrays ..........................................................................................163
Chapter 13: Fun with Text.............................................................................................181
Chapter 14: Structures, the Multivariable ..................................................................199
Chapter 15: Life at the Command Prompt ..................................................................209
Chapter 16: Variable Nonsense ....................................................................................219
Chapter 17: Binary Mania .............................................................................................231
Part IV: The Advanced Part ...................................... 249
Chapter 18: Introduction to Pointers ..........................................................................251
Chapter 19: Deep into Pointer Land ............................................................................267
Chapter 20: Linked Lists ...............................................................................................287
Chapter 21: It’s About Time ..........................................................................................307
Part V: And the Rest of It ......................................... 315
Chapter 22: Permanent Storage Functions .................................................................317
Chapter 23: File Management .......................................................................................335
Chapter 24: Beyond Mere Mortal Projects .................................................................345
Chapter 25: Out, Bugs! ...................................................................................................355
Part VI: The Part of Tens .......................................... 367
Chapter 26: Ten Common Boo-Boos ...........................................................................369
Chapter 27: Ten Reminders and Suggestions .............................................................377
Afterword ................................................................ 385
Appendix A: ASCII Codes .......................................... 387
Appendix B: Keywords ............................................. 393
Appendix C: Operators .............................................. 395
Appendix D: Variable Types ...................................... 397
Appendix E: Escape Sequences .................................. 399
Appendix F: Conversion Characters ............................ 401
Appendix G: Order of Precedence .............................. 403
Index ...................................................................... 405
Table of Contents
Introduction ................................................................. 1
Is the C Language Relevant? ...........................................................................1
The C Programming For Dummies Approach ..............................................2
How This Book Works .....................................................................................2
Icons Used in This Book .................................................................................4
Parting Thoughts .............................................................................................4
Part I: Getting Started with C Programming ................... 7
Chapter 1: A Quick Start for the Impatient . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
What You Need in Order to Program ............................................................9
Obtaining programming tools ..............................................................9
Acquiring an Integrated Development Environment (IDE).............10
Behold the Code::Blocks IDE ........................................................................10
Installing Code::Blocks ........................................................................10
Touring the Code::Blocks workspace ................................................12
Your First Project ..........................................................................................14
Creating a new project ........................................................................14
Examining the source code ................................................................16
Building and running the project .......................................................18
Saving and closing ...............................................................................19
Chapter 2: The Programming Thing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
The History of Programming ........................................................................21
Reviewing early programming history ..............................................22
Introducing the C language .................................................................22
The Programming Process ...........................................................................23
Understanding programming .............................................................23
Writing source code ............................................................................24
Compiling to object code ....................................................................26
Linking in the C library ........................................................................27
Running and testing .............................................................................28
viii
Beginning Programming with C For Dummies
Chapter 3: Anatomy of C . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Parts of the C Language ................................................................................31
Keywords ..............................................................................................32
Functions ..............................................................................................33
Operators ..............................................................................................34
Variables and values ...........................................................................35
Statements and structure ...................................................................35
Comments .............................................................................................36
Behold the Typical C Program .....................................................................38
Understanding C program structure .................................................39
Setting the main() function ................................................................39
Returning something to the operating system ................................40
Adding a function .................................................................................41
Part II: C Programming 101 ........................................ 45
Chapter 4: Trials and Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Display Stuff on the Screen ..........................................................................47
Displaying a humorous message .......................................................47
Introducing the puts() function.........................................................48
Adding more text .................................................................................49
Commenting out a statement .............................................................50
Goofing up on purpose ........................................................................51
More Display Nonsense ................................................................................53
Displaying text with printf() ..............................................................53
Introducing the printf() function.......................................................54
Understanding the newline .................................................................55
Employing escape sequences.............................................................55
Goofing up on purpose again .............................................................57
Chapter 5: Values and Constants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
A Venue for Various Values ..........................................................................59
Understanding values ..........................................................................60
Displaying values with printf() ..........................................................60
Minding the extra zeroes ....................................................................62
The Computer Does the Math ......................................................................63
Doing simple arithmetic ......................................................................63
Reviewing the float-integer thing .......................................................65
Always the Same ............................................................................................66
Using the same value over and over .................................................66
Introducing constants .........................................................................67
Putting constants to use .....................................................................68