The Computer’s Brain
You may know that the brain of a computer is the central processing unit (CPU). Some computers may have more than one CPU inside. A CPU has millions of transistors that make use of electronic switches. The electronic switches have only two states: off and on. (Symbolically, 0 and 1 are used to represent the two states.) Therefore, a computer can only understand instructions consisting of series of 0s and 1s. In other words, machine-readable instructions have to be in binary format.
However, a computer program written in a high-level language, such as C, Java, or Perl, is just a text file, consisting of English-like characters and words. We have to use some special programs, called compilers or interpreters, to translate such a program into a machine-readable code. That is, the text format of all instructions written in a high-level language has to be converted into the binary format. The code obtained after the translation is called binary code. Prior to the translation, a program in text format is called source code.
The smallest unit of the binary code is called a bit (from binary digit), which can have a value of 0 or 1. 8 bits make up one byte, and half a byte (4 bits) is one nibble.
In addition, the C language has other advantages. Programs written in C can be reused. You can save your C programs into a library file and invoke them in your next programming project simply by including the library file. More details on using libraries and invoking C library functions are covered in the rest of this book.
C is a relatively small programming language, which makes life easier for you. You don’t have to remember many C keywords or commands before you start to write programs in C to solve problems in the real world.
For those who seek speed while still keeping the convenience and elegance of a high-level language, the C language is probably the best choice. In fact, C allows you to get control of computer hardware and peripherals. That’s why the C language is sometimes called the lowest high-level programming language.
Many other high-level languages have been developed based on C. For instance, Perl is a popular programming language in World Wide Web (WWW) design across the Internet. Perl actually borrows a lot of features from C. If you understand C, learning Perl is a snap. Another example is the C++ language, which is simply an expanded version of C, although C++ makes object-oriented programming easier. Also, learning Java becomes much easier if you already know C.
NOTE:
There are two types of programming languages: compiled language and interpreted language.
A compiler is needed to translate a program written in a compiled language into machine-understandable code (that is, binary code) before you can run the program on your machine. When the translation is done, the binary code can be saved into an application file. You can keep running the application file without the compiler unless the program (source code) is updated and you have to recompile it. The binary code or application file is also called executable code (or an executable file).
On the other hand, a program written in an interpreted language can be run immediately after you finish writing it. But such a program always needs an interpreter to translate the high-level instructions into machine-understandable instructions (binary code) at runtime. You cannot run the program on a machine unless the right interpreter is available.
You can think of the C language as a compiled language because most C language vendors make only C compilers to support programs written in C.