Ask HN: Should I learn C?

Yes, you should learn C. And enough assembly language to understand aspects of how C works, like what a "stack frame" is.

Now is a great time to start. Go find K&R, fire up Linux and write and compile "hello, world". Then keep going until you experience your first segmentation fault. ;)

(Do not study C++ at this point. Study C. These things turn out to be very very different.)

Even though C is used more and more rarely outside of systems programming, I definitely recommend learning it. Learning about pointer arithmetic, memory management, etc... will give you a depth of understanding in other programming languages that other students will be sorely lacking the first few years of college. Other than a little OS-hacking on the side, I've never used it for a project, but understanding how C works has helped me debug much more effectively in several other languages.

I, like many here, would strongly recommend learning C. I don't know if I'd call it "profitable" to do so at the moment, assuming you mean profitable in the money sense.

C is a good language to learn, and a lot of interesting, well-paying jobs use C, and a lot of interesting open-source projects use C -- but if you just want to make steady cash, you can do so much easier with Java or PHP.

That said, if you go about your programming self-education correctly, you won't have a problem using Java or PHP (well, you won't have a problem in the sense that it won't be difficult for you to design programs in those languages).

It's good to have a handle on how the architecture of your machine works. C gets you much closer to that, and you will learn about a lot of things that are hidden from you in HLLs like Python, but that are still relevant to non-trivial programs.

So yeah. Learn C if you're passionate about comp-sci, or software engineering. If you're learning programming only for a career, it may not be as beneficial for you. Learning C before college is definitely a good thing.

Also, if you learn C, the last chapter of SICP is much easier to do, and you should go through SICP at some point ;)

Don't touch C++ until you need to touch C++. You'll know when that time is, if ever.

A lot of people take the route of not learning C. If you do web development and your team finds something hard or impossible to do, watch their reaction when you say "I'll just write a C extension."

The stack-frame comment is spot-freaking-on. Knowing this level of detail will make you a way better programmer in every other language because you won't make stupid memory hogging decisions or mistakes. You also understand the complexity of doing things one way and the tradeoffs of another.

I best learnt C by re-writing large portions of the Pintos operating system. It's an academic OS and will be interesting to look at the source. Systems programming is where C packs the most punch, but all of those concepts can be re-applied in user land for some amazing effects.

It's better if you dont ask!

I don't believe that Linus ever asked (someone else) if he should learn C. Or that Damien Katz (couchdb creator) ever asked if he should learn Erlang. Or if Brad Fitzpatrick (Livejournal & Danga) ever asked if he should learn Perl!

Just learn what you (from looking around) believe will make you a better or smarter, what is even more important use what you learn. Don't just learn to learn!

Yes! Learn C!! But learn it with a view towards using it to inform your use of other languages. The low-level aspects (pointers, memory management, working with .DLL or object libraries) are things that most languages, however fluent or high-level, use under the hood.

Spolsky and Atwood argued this out in Stackoverflow Podcast #2. http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2008/04/podcast-2/

Just get a comfort level with it (C), and move on. It will pay dividends.

I really only have experience with web development with Rails and in PHP. I also have done a little Java at school. I am considering diving into iPhone development and learning Objective C. Would I get at least some of the benefits of learning C that you all have described in this thread from Objective C? From what I understand you even have to learn some raw C to work with Objective C.

Absolutely, yes.

+ From the point of view of Python or Java (say), it's close enough to assembly language to let you understand how things might work;

+ If you need speed or control over hardware, sometimes it's your best route to extend whatever you're working in;

+ In many jobs you'll be the only one who has the knowledge to do unusual things, hence you'll be more valuable;

+ It gives you another point of view when designing systems;

+ You say you'll need it for college - learn it now;

+ A spread of languages is critical if you want to master programming.

You can carve out a perfectly good programming career without knowing C, but it's always of benefit and value to get a wide range of skills. Some recommend:

+ Pure OOP: perhaps smalltalk or Self

+ Pure Functional: perhaps Haskell (non-strict) or ML (strict)

+ Pure Imperative: perhaps C

+ Pure Logic: perhaps Prolog

Other hybrid languages are useful and perhaps more productive, but it's the ideas that really matter while you're still learning.

C is lingua franca of programming languages. Even if you don't find yourself programming with it, it will still be useful.

You won't learn anything unless you need it, and it depends on your interests whether you need C in your programmings.

Other than that, I can't speak for anyone but myself.

For me, C has taught me so much since I was 14 that I couldn't possibly be where I am if I hadn't spent years writing C and I couldn't possibly recommend anyone not to learn it. But it's a different world for everyone and I can't say it's a bad thing if you don't know C. It would be a bad thing in my line of business but not everyone does the same things I do.

One thing about C is that it's a nice forced marriage with the von Neumann machines we're using these days. If you really want to know C, you really want to know the current hardware architecture as well. It will change but it won't do that at least in the next couple of decades.

On the other hand, mastering high-level languages first and dropping down when necessary might be a wise choice, if you only know you can do it. Like I said, architectures and paradigms will change in the future, and higher-level languages can embody abstractions that are very hard if impossible to contain in a von Neumann machine and it is the revolution of some new architecture when C will eventually be obsoleted.

No, you should learn Java instead. The leap from Python to C would be atrocious, but the leap from Python to Java would be feasible. (And if, after feeling comfortable with Java, the leap from Java to C becomes reasonable too).

You'd want to learn C to get a feeling for how the computer works at the core, but more important than that you should be seeking a rock-solid foundation in proper coding methods and structures that has potential off-branches into your courses and your career.

From Java, you could pursue Android development or even Objective-C for iOS development. From C, that transition would be frustrating to say the least.

(Other points behind pursuing Java is you'd find it quicker to start testing on your local box without needing to seek help, it'd give you great insight into what an IDE is and why it is your best friend, and there are more community projects surrounding Java than C that you could start to participate in when you're ready.)

In the end, any language you want to learn would be a good language to learn (even Fortran), but you should go after a language that you can go from 0-to-novice on your own in a short time where you'll end having built a nice repertoire, and I think Java would best suit that need for you.

C yes, C++ no.

Make sure you're using a C compiler, not a C++ compiler

Here is why not C++: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1463592 and why not java

Edit: Was there something wrong with my comment? Or were you downvoting merely because you disagree?

Absolutely yes.

There's no downside in learning C, and there's not much fluff in the language core to complicate things, or slow things down.

I'd suggest you get a copy of K&R: The C Programming Language and just work through the text and examples. You might also want to pick an existing C-based project and work on bugs in it, maintenance programming being one of the best ways to get to grips with using the key tools, gcc and gdb.

This way you'll get a feel for the language, and also for what you'll need to debug and fix code.

Yes. You won't really know python or javascript until you learn C. You may gain some empirical knowledge about how various parts of those languages operate, but without knowing C, you won't understand the "why". If you understand the "why", you'll occasionally be able to intuitively see solutions that would never have occurred to you otherwise. Those are the sorts of key problems that can make all the difference in the success of the project and of your career.

Any language you learn will make learning additional languages easier and faster. But, the boost you get from learning C is arguably greater than for other languages. It's also the single most powerful backup language you can know.

I would suggest Python and C, in that order. Python will let you quickly have fun building large applications, and it will teach you object oriented programming. Once you know what a loop is, though, go by "Advanced Programming in the Unix Environment" and a decent C book and trip out on that for a year or so to really understand how computers work.

I don't write C for a living at all, but it is great to know how everything is working under the hood, and APUE will teach you that.

To be honest, I wouldn't bother with Java. I think in ten years Java will look like Ada does now: we will all be asking ourselves "What were we thinking?"

I also wouldn't bother working on anything but Unix, but that is just bias...

You should absolutely learn C - you don't need to be an expert, but you should fully grasp the use of pointers and memory allocation, and how the compiler really works (intermediate stages and all that).

This, for the same reason you should learn some provisional level of assembler on an older 8 or 16 bit processor with a simple instruction set (intel 8080 or 8086, and then maybe something RISC just for kicks). You don't need to be an expert, just dabble enough that you "get" how it works.

Also learn how to implemenet a few other progrmaming patterns in C - you can do OO in C, you can do functional in C, you can do concurrent in C. You likely won't have to in real life, but understanding those concepts at the level of C will really help you understand the benefits of higher level languages.

I'd say the same for any of the Lisps - learn one, even if you'll never use it - the insights it gives you are worth it and will make your other code better.

My answer to the question "Should I learn <programming language x>?" is almost always "yes". Even if you never need to use it, it's always good to have a different way of looking at things.

One thing you might want to look at is cython[1]. It allows you to write C extensions in a Python-like language. Could be useful as a "bridge".

[1] http://cython.org/

Yes, learn C. I've tried to avoid it for years, but it's actually a beautiful and simple language. It's very powerful and low-level, which means that it's easy to create ugly programs, but that's another problem.

If you ever have to do low-level programming or Mac/iOS development it will definitely be of great use.

In my opinion, instead of asking and spending time reading the comments of everyone saying why you should learn C, you should have actually learned C. It's a great language and learning it will surely help you in your career.

Think of it this way: Why not learning it?

Theoretical aspects:

I assume that you want to be a good hacker. A good hacker has a healthy mix of knowledge that will allow him to start work quickly on almost anything. Without a solid grounding in C, (and a perspective of JS and Python), there are a whole class of things that you won't be comfortable working with unless you have some lower level experience.

With your current knowledge, how easy would it be for you to start hacking on an IP stack? Not that you would ever need to, but with a good knowledge of C such a thing becomes natural to you. All of those RFCs begin to make much more sense.

Another big benefit to C is how simple it is. You begin to see how possible it would be to create a simple C compiler, and this is a good spot for this intuition. It has a simple syntax, is somewhat feature-poor, and is very close to the hardware.

Plus, you'd be able to hack on CPython if you want ;)

Practical aspects:

Your knowledge seems to say that you are headed for web development, which I applaud, because all things exciting are happening on the web.

Web development is changing. It used to be that web developers were laughed at, considered to be inferior to other programmers. It has been a few years since I've seen that opinion, and I think it has been thoroughly shown to be wrong.

Web development has become, essentially, a two part system where the pretty web front end sits as an interface to a super hardcore back end. Web companies now face scaling issues that are relatively new to web development. While you may never program in C, having a strong foundation on what the underlying issues are.

Either way you look at it, learn C is to get a better understanding of technology. It will certainly do that for you very well.

Short answer: yes.

Long answer maybe you also want to learn some assembler to see how the machine really work (I would recommend programming a simple microcontroller or the lego NXT things).

If you manage to learn C. It will be easier later to learn an object oriented language later. (Java, C# or C++)

The problem (and the frustrating thing) will be that you first probably wont achieve much by using pure c. Therefore you can also start with toolkits like processing.org which can teach you basics about algorithmic thinking.

Ah just saw that you did Python and JS first. So yes I suggest learning C or C++ (maybe C first, because it's easier)

Absolutely! By learning to deal with pointer manipulation and memory allocation, you can learn what it is, why it is necessary and how to recognize when it is broken. One of the problems with garbage collection is that it suffers from a memory management problem at a higher level of abstraction. There was an entry in an autonomous vehicle competition a few years ago that stalled. Physical objects in the environment were represented internally as objects in the code. When the vehicle passed them, they were moved to a collection of objects that had already been identified but were out of the field of view. That collection grew unbounded even with garbage collection because every one of those objects was still referenced.

There is no wasted knowledge, C is a primitive language, but could teach you things that many other languages cannot.

Consider proper memory management, et al. There are other languages that implement similar features that C does, but ANSI C is a macro-assembler in the truest sense of the word.

Pick up a copy of "The C Programming Language, by Kernighan and Ritchie" and do the exercises.

Good luck.