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Ohloh says I've changed at least half million lines of C code (https://www.ohloh.net/accounts/rhp/positions/total https://www.ohloh.net/accounts/rhp/positions/t

by hp 15y ago

Ohloh says I've changed at least half million lines of C code (https://www.ohloh.net/accounts/rhp/positions/total https://www.ohloh.net/accounts/rhp/positions/total) Play me a tiny violin ;-) What kinda bugs me is that whenever people go to teach C, they make out like it _has_ to be a low-level exercise, as if writing in C suddenly means you can't use abstract data types or object-oriented style or name your functions properly or have Unicode support. For example, people teach libc string APIs like scanf() and strtok(), which should almost never be used. (See http://vsftpd.beasts.org/IMPLEMENTATION http://vsftpd.beasts.org/IMPLEMENTATION for one take.) Instead, use http://git.gnome.org/browse/glib/tree/glib/gstring.h http://git.gnome.org/browse/glib/tree/glib/gstring.h or write your own like http://cgit.freedesktop.org/dbus/dbus/tree/dbus/dbus-string.h http://cgit.freedesktop.org/dbus/dbus/tree/dbus/dbus-string.... If you're going to display user-visible text, you are pretty much required to link to GLib or another Unicode library, since libc doesn't have what you need (unless you want to use the old pre-unicode multi-encoding insanity). Don't use fgets() and other pain like that, use g_file_get_contents() perhaps, or another library. (g_file_get_contents is in http://developer.gnome.org/glib/stable/glib-File-Utilities.html http://developer.gnome.org/glib/stable/glib-File-Utilities.h...) You need help from a library other than libc to deal with portability, internationalization, security, and general sanity. Maybe more importantly, a library will show you examples that in C you can still use all the good design principles you'd use in a higher-level language. I told someone to "use a string class" in C recently for example, and they said "C doesn't have classes" - this is confusing syntax with concepts. C requires more typing and more worrying about memory management, that's all. It doesn't mean that all the best practices you know can be tossed. There's a whole lot to be said about how to write large, maintainable codebases in C, and it can even be done. It's not something I would or do choose to do these days, but it can be done. One other thought, two of the highest-profile C codebases, the Linux kernel and the C library, have extremely weird requirements that simply do not apply to most regular programs. However, a lot of people working in C or writing about C have experience with those codebases, and it shows.

alf 15y ago
C shouldn't be used for anything other than low level programming these days. There are other higher level programming language that would make your job a whole lot easier. Some programmers, like me, are stuck maintaining legacy C application code, but I wouldn't wish that fate for new programmers looking to learn C as another tool in the belt.
- hp 15y ago
  Maybe "low level" is a bit ambiguous. I certainly agree that C is most appropriate when you are "low in the stack," just above the operating system and maybe implementing something like a virtual machine. I don't make a habit of writing stuff in C for no reason and the vast majority of programming these days isn't and shouldn't be in C (or C++ for that matter). However, "low in the stack" is different from "low level" like "I refuse to use modern practices" or "I get to omit half the letters from my function names." You can be coding an on-the-metal kind of thing and still think about it in a high level way.
  - alf 15y ago
    Right, agreed. :)
- z92 15y ago
  Other uses of C besides low level programming is: 1. Building static libraries. 2. Building so and dll. 3. Binding those so/dll with higher level languages like Ruby, Python, Perl and PHP. That is my main use of C these days. I always write the IO, user interface code in higher level languages and put all processing code in a so or dll written in C.
  - regularfry 15y ago
    I've done a bit of this in Haskell, and it can be remarkably clean. It can also be a right pain, though.
  - malkia 15y ago
    Yup. Same here. Having not to deal with exceptions, STL libs, makes life a bit easier.
JoshTriplett 15y ago
The Linux kernel, weird requirements and all, actually represents an excellent example of using C well. It has high-level functions, objects, classes, abstract data types, interfaces, and many other useful abstractions to make C almost comfortable.
- hp 15y ago
  Agreed, but it's still sort of a weird case, I think. The considerations related to things like memory allocation, performance, concurrency, internationalization, security, IO, etc. are pretty different in the kernel.
zedshaw 15y ago
I'm glad you got so much about how my book is written from a few paragraphs in an unfinished manuscript for it.
- hp 15y ago
  I was just going off on a generic tangent, obviously I don't know what your book will be like. Just talking about C since it's 1am and vaguely on-topic.
- anacrolix 15y ago
  On that note, I see you are going for real old fundamentals. puts() is in your _first_ example. While learning core library stuff is important for C, I think you should make sure to make absolutely NO reference to anything deprecated or mildly dangerous. After all, your book is for noobs, and we all want C to look good.
- speckledjim 15y ago
  You should stop thinking everyone is attacking you. I think you'd be happier. Really though, there's no content here. The fact it's been voted to #1 on hackernews shows just how bad things are. Items should be upvoted on their merit, rather than who did them. Someone writing another book about programming C isn't newsworthy.
  - thebooktocome 15y ago
    I don't really understand your comment. 1. The post is about Zed's draft; is it really so far of a leap to interpret hp's remarks as a criticism of the book? 2. Is this a fair paraphrase? "Everyone here isn't attacking you, also, your draft sucks and shouldn't have been posted on HN."
    - baha_man 15y ago
      ' Is this a fair paraphrase? "Everyone here isn't attacking you, also, your draft sucks and shouldn't have been posted on HN."' No, it's not. speckledjim is complaining that someone writing another book on C is not news, he doesn't say anything about the draft sucking.
omaranto 15y ago
Of course, in most languages you can use most programming language features by "typing more", but when a certain feature is not provided by the language or a standard library or at least a de facto standard library, everybody will implement it in a slightly different, incompatible way. I assume that is what people mean by "C doesn't have classes".

by hp 15y ago

alf 15y ago

C shouldn't be used for anything other than low level programming these days. There are other higher level programming language that would make your job a whole lot easier. Some programmers, like me, are stuck maintaining legacy C application code, but I wouldn't wish that fate for new programmers looking to learn C as another tool in the belt.

hp 15y ago
Maybe "low level" is a bit ambiguous. I certainly agree that C is most appropriate when you are "low in the stack," just above the operating system and maybe implementing something like a virtual machine. I don't make a habit of writing stuff in C for no reason and the vast majority of programming these days isn't and shouldn't be in C (or C++ for that matter). However, "low in the stack" is different from "low level" like "I refuse to use modern practices" or "I get to omit half the letters from my function names." You can be coding an on-the-metal kind of thing and still think about it in a high level way.
- alf 15y ago
  Right, agreed. :)
z92 15y ago
Other uses of C besides low level programming is: 1. Building static libraries. 2. Building so and dll. 3. Binding those so/dll with higher level languages like Ruby, Python, Perl and PHP. That is my main use of C these days. I always write the IO, user interface code in higher level languages and put all processing code in a so or dll written in C.
- regularfry 15y ago
  I've done a bit of this in Haskell, and it can be remarkably clean. It can also be a right pain, though.
- malkia 15y ago
  Yup. Same here. Having not to deal with exceptions, STL libs, makes life a bit easier.

JoshTriplett 15y ago

The Linux kernel, weird requirements and all, actually represents an excellent example of using C well. It has high-level functions, objects, classes, abstract data types, interfaces, and many other useful abstractions to make C almost comfortable.

hp 15y ago
Agreed, but it's still sort of a weird case, I think. The considerations related to things like memory allocation, performance, concurrency, internationalization, security, IO, etc. are pretty different in the kernel.

zedshaw 15y ago

I'm glad you got so much about how my book is written from a few paragraphs in an unfinished manuscript for it.

hp 15y ago
I was just going off on a generic tangent, obviously I don't know what your book will be like. Just talking about C since it's 1am and vaguely on-topic.
anacrolix 15y ago
On that note, I see you are going for real old fundamentals. puts() is in your _first_ example. While learning core library stuff is important for C, I think you should make sure to make absolutely NO reference to anything deprecated or mildly dangerous. After all, your book is for noobs, and we all want C to look good.
speckledjim 15y ago
You should stop thinking everyone is attacking you. I think you'd be happier. Really though, there's no content here. The fact it's been voted to #1 on hackernews shows just how bad things are. Items should be upvoted on their merit, rather than who did them. Someone writing another book about programming C isn't newsworthy.
- thebooktocome 15y ago
  I don't really understand your comment. 1. The post is about Zed's draft; is it really so far of a leap to interpret hp's remarks as a criticism of the book? 2. Is this a fair paraphrase? "Everyone here isn't attacking you, also, your draft sucks and shouldn't have been posted on HN."
  - baha_man 15y ago
    ' Is this a fair paraphrase? "Everyone here isn't attacking you, also, your draft sucks and shouldn't have been posted on HN."' No, it's not. speckledjim is complaining that someone writing another book on C is not news, he doesn't say anything about the draft sucking.

omaranto 15y ago

Of course, in most languages you can use most programming language features by "typing more", but when a certain feature is not provided by the language or a standard library or at least a de facto standard library, everybody will implement it in a slightly different, incompatible way. I assume that is what people mean by "C doesn't have classes".