Features of C Programming Language

C is a popular general purpose programming language. It was designed and developed by Dennis Ritchie in 1972 at Bell Laboratories. It is an offspring of the "Basic Combined Programming Language" called 'B' developed in 1960 at Cambridge University. The C language is closely associated with UNIX operating system. The source code for the UNIX operating system is codded in C. This language runs under a number of operating systems including MS-DOS. C Programs are efficient, fast, and highly portable, that is, C programs written on one computer can be run on another computer with little or no modifications. 

Features of C Programming Language

      C is a beautiful language and provides many built-in functions that help in problem solving. We list out certain common features of C that have been quite useful.

1. C is a powerful, flexible language that provides fast program execution and imposes few constraints on the programmer.
2. C's power and fast program execution come from it's ability to access low level commands, similar to assembly language, but with high level syntax.
3. Another strong point of C is it's use of modularity. Section of code can be stored in libraries for re-use in future programs. This concept of modularity also helps with C's portability and execution speed.
4. C is a block-structured language with fundamental flow-control construction.
5. C includes certain low-level features that are normally available in assembly or machine language.
6. Programs written in C compile into small object programs that execute efficiently.
7. C is a largely machine independent language and programs written in C can be easily ported from one computer to another.
8. C compilers are widely available in most personal computers.
9.  C is a core language 
10. C is an extensible language 
11. C is well suited for structure programming and it is loosely typing.
12. Small in size. It have only 32 keywords. This makes it relatively easy to learn.
13. Stable and Quick Language 

Uses of  C Programming Language

                              There are so many places where C play an important role. Here are some of the most useful C Programming language features.

1. C language is primarily used for system programming. The portability, efficiency, the ability to access specific hardware addresses and low run-time demand on system resources makes it a good choice for implementing operating systems and embedded system applications.
2. C has been so widely accepted by professionals that compilers, libraries, and interpreters of other programming languages are often implemented in C.
3. For portability and convenience reasons, C is sometimes used as an intermediate language by implementations of other languages. Example of compilers which use C this way are BitC, Gambit, the Glasgow Haskell Compiler, Squeak, and Vala.