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Ask HN: Good C (not C++) code for reading/learning?

7 points by jgalvez 18y ago

I'd like to polish up my C. Can you recommend some good open source projects which are good examples of coding style and organization in C?

silentbicycle 18y ago
The source for Lua is pretty good (if a little dense at times), and you can read it in-browser: http://www.lua.org/source/5.1/ http://www.lua.org/source/5.1/ There's a suggested roadmap for reading it, too: http://www.reddit.com/comments/63hth/ask_reddit_which_oss_codebases_out_there_are_so/c02pxbp http://www.reddit.com/comments/63hth/ask_reddit_which_oss_co... It is written in ruthlessly standard ANSI C (for maximum portability). It will probably also complement your C -- it's intended to be a handy drop-in scripting language to embed in C programs, though it's also a pretty cool language on its own merits. They had an unwavering focus on keeping it clean and very small for embedding, and they make some really interesting choices along the way. It's sort of like a minimalistic Python; it gets a lot of power out of using "tables" (rather like Python dictionaries or Perl hashes) as a primary data type.
SwellJoe 18y ago
SQLite is always recommended in threads like this (of which, I will point out, there have been several here and at reddit...you might like to search for them). I haven't looked at it since very early releases, but I'm guessing quality has gotten better over time, since it is more stable than ever and faster than ever, and still astoundingly lightweight.
- yourabi 18y ago
  Interesting
rmk 18y ago
How about the Linux Kernel? - Well-documented. - Always good to know. - Good, well-organised code. - Real-life C code.
RobGR 18y ago
This is probably more than you are looking for, but the fftw code ( www.fftw.org ) is a pretty amazingly designed piece of C code that does some very advanced stuff. However, if you trying to get off to a good start, you might want simplistic examples. One thing I think helps you become a better programmer, is to read your own code carefully a long time after you have written it.
dchest 18y ago
Git?
bayareaguy 18y ago
It's a little dated now but the Tcl/Tk source is very good. I'd also recommend the FreeBSD source tree.
xpaulbettsx 18y ago
GNOME code and the Linux kernel are both pretty good examples - writing a well-structured, small GTK+ app will do wonders for your C skills
reginaldo 18y ago
One piece of code I found particularly useful was the old tftp. It's small enough yet very instructive.

7 points by jgalvez 18y ago

I'd like to polish up my C. Can you recommend some good open source projects which are good examples of coding style and organization in C?

silentbicycle 18y ago

The source for Lua is pretty good (if a little dense at times), and you can read it in-browser: http://www.lua.org/source/5.1/ http://www.lua.org/source/5.1/ There's a suggested roadmap for reading it, too: http://www.reddit.com/comments/63hth/ask_reddit_which_oss_codebases_out_there_are_so/c02pxbp http://www.reddit.com/comments/63hth/ask_reddit_which_oss_co... It is written in ruthlessly standard ANSI C (for maximum portability). It will probably also complement your C -- it's intended to be a handy drop-in scripting language to embed in C programs, though it's also a pretty cool language on its own merits. They had an unwavering focus on keeping it clean and very small for embedding, and they make some really interesting choices along the way. It's sort of like a minimalistic Python; it gets a lot of power out of using "tables" (rather like Python dictionaries or Perl hashes) as a primary data type.

SwellJoe 18y ago

SQLite is always recommended in threads like this (of which, I will point out, there have been several here and at reddit...you might like to search for them). I haven't looked at it since very early releases, but I'm guessing quality has gotten better over time, since it is more stable than ever and faster than ever, and still astoundingly lightweight.

yourabi 18y ago
Interesting

rmk 18y ago

How about the Linux Kernel? - Well-documented. - Always good to know. - Good, well-organised code. - Real-life C code.

RobGR 18y ago

This is probably more than you are looking for, but the fftw code ( www.fftw.org ) is a pretty amazingly designed piece of C code that does some very advanced stuff. However, if you trying to get off to a good start, you might want simplistic examples. One thing I think helps you become a better programmer, is to read your own code carefully a long time after you have written it.

dchest 18y ago

Git?

bayareaguy 18y ago

It's a little dated now but the Tcl/Tk source is very good. I'd also recommend the FreeBSD source tree.

xpaulbettsx 18y ago

GNOME code and the Linux kernel are both pretty good examples - writing a well-structured, small GTK+ app will do wonders for your C skills

reginaldo 18y ago

One piece of code I found particularly useful was the old tftp. It's small enough yet very instructive.