Introduction to C Language Programming
In the early 1980s, common software engineering practice was based on structured
programming. Structured programming was implemented in order to help "break down"
programs into smaller parts, primarily to make them easier to work on as they grew
increasingly large. However, as the problems being solved grew in size, structured
programming became less useful as more and more procedures had to be written, leading
to complex control structures and a low level of code reuse.
Many saw object-oriented programming as a potential solution to the problem. In fact,
Smalltalk had already addressed many of these engineering issues; some of the most
complex systems in the world were Smalltalk environments.[citation needed] On the
downside, Smalltalk used a virtual machine. The virtual machine interpreted an object
memory called an image, containing all development tools. The Smalltalk image was
very large and tended to require huge amounts of memory for the time and ran very
slowly, partly due to the lack of useful hardware VM/container support.
Objective-C was created primarily by Brad Cox and Tom Love in the early 1980s at their
company Stepstone. Both had been introduced to Smalltalk while at ITT Corporation’s
Programming Technology Center in 1981. Cox had become interested in the problems of
true reusability in software design and programming. He realized that a language like
Smalltalk would be invaluable in building powerful development environments for
system developers at ITT. Cox began by modifying the C compiler to add some of the
capabilities of Smalltalk. He soon had a working implementation of an object-oriented
extension to the C language, which he called "OOPC" for Object-Oriented Programming
in C. Meanwhile, Love was hired by Schlumberger Research in 1982 and had the
opportunity to acquire the first commercial copy of Smalltalk-80, which further
influenced development of their brainchild.
In order to demonstrate that real progress could be made, Cox showed that making
interchangeable software components really needed only a few practical changes to
existing tools. Specifically, they needed to support objects in a flexible manner, come
supplied with a usable set of libraries, and allow for the code (and any resources needed
by the code) to be bundled into a single cross-platform format.
Love and Cox eventually formed a new venture, Productivity Products International
(PPI), to commercialize their product, which coupled an Objective-C compiler with
powerful class libraries.
In 1986, Cox published the main description of Objective-C in its original form in the
book Object-Oriented Programming, An Evolutionary Approach. Although he was
careful to point out that there is more to the problem of reusability than just the language,
Objective-C often found itself compared feature for feature with other languages.
Introduction to C Language Programming
X24 (2 semester units in EECS)
An elective in the Post-Baccalaureate Certificate Program in Information Systems and
Management
Learn the C programming language and fundamental programming concepts even if you
don't consider yourself a programmer. On successful completion of the course, you are
able to write simple C language applications and undertake courses that assume some
background in computer programming, such as C++, C#, Java, and Perl. Topics you study
include variables, data types, functions, control structures, pointers, strings, arrays, and
dynamic allocation principles. You need access to any programming environment that
allows you to write, edit, compile, link, and debug a C program.
Prerequisite: While no previous programming experience is required, you should have
access to a computer hosting a C/C++ compiler or access to the Internet to allow you to
download and install a C/C++ compiler. Familiarity with fundamental programming
language concepts such as variables, data types and compiling source code is helpful.
In the early 1980s, common software engineering practice was based on structured
programming
