What makes C so great?

[Teh-J0k3r]

I've been programming in Java for years, and am now starting to push myself into learning other languages.  I've heard that C is a great language to learn because it helps you learn a lot about memory allocation and things, but I dunno if it's for me really.  I've taken an Operating Systems class(we used a little C to talk about fork() and exec()), so I feel like i know how memory management works for the most part.  Anyone have any insight on this?

[bakslache]

I think C and C-like languages are good to learn if for no other reason than the fact that they are REALLY common languages for all kinds of needs, and because of this there is a wealth of code, and documentation, and other resources available. I started with C, didn't learn much, then took courses in C++ and now its my language of choice. So it's really about finding what you're comfortable with and what meets your needs and expectations. But if you like OOP, I suggest C++ over C, just my opinion.

Use the language that you love, and everything always works out for the best

[Teh-J0k3r]

thanks bakslache, where would be a good place to start to find code to look at?

[bakslache]

Right here in our own forum lol, we have C and C++ code

but if you want more specific sites then:

http://www.cprogramming.com/

http://www.cplusplus.com/

http://www.cpp4u.com/

these are all pretty good general sites to start with, most good programming sites have sections for both C and C++. I also have a couple e-books if you want me to post them on here

[Teh-J0k3r]

this will work for now thanks 

[xzid]

C is great, as said it good for learning. It teaches efficient programming.

Things you get in higher-level languages like C++, such as templates and namespaces, may help on large development projects. But otherwise, they just make your program bloated. To print something out, why run the string through 3 functions instead of just write()'ing strait to stdout? Why nest your function inside a class when you could just write a single function?

And C, unlike java, is converted to strait assembly. Isnt run through a bytecode int., allowing you to use the GNU binutils instead of the JDK.

The internet & your OS are structured programming, both of which were designed around C.

 > Learn it, just don't do GUI with it.

PS: C is fun to code too, too bad I lost my old code. I woulda shown you some text parsing with C... Without string.h!!!!! 

[Teh-J0k3r]

Thanks xzid, this actually cleared things up for a bit.  Much appreciated!