Newbie: The C / C++ Issue

[Lucas Holt]

On Nov 11, 2003, at 9:06 PM, Alex Kelly wrote:

> Thanks for all of the great suggestions to my previous question!
>
> Yet, the responses have led me to another question. If C++ is newer 
> and more advanced than C, will it replace C? If so, should I learn C++ 
> and forget C?
>
> Alex
> _______________________________________________
>

It hasn't yet.  C++ and C are used by different types of people for 
different things.  If you want to write applications in Windows or Unix 
environments, C++ will work great for you.  If you want to write kernel 
level stuff, C would be the choice.  If you want to write Mac OS X 
apps, Objective C is the answer (but C would work too with Carbon).

A few more points:
The C programming Language AKA K&R is partly authored by Dennis 
Ritchie.  He wrote the language.  That is THE book.  Buy it and another 
book if you want to learn C.

The C++ programming language is also written by the author of the 
language.  Its a good reference, but you can't learn C++ with it.  You 
need more books.  I have the C++ o'rielly book and its good, but lacks 
decent info on Object oriented programming.  I'd recommend Absolute C++ 
along with it to get the basics and then buy the C++ programming 
language if you really get into it.

As for what language to learn, I can tell you that C is very helpful 
when learning C++ and Objective C.  I took a course on C last year and 
its helped greatly with the C++ course I'm taking now.  I understand 
where things come from in C++.  I must say that C++ is easier than C in 
my view as i get Object oriented programming to some degree from VB and 
Java work i've done.  I'm also starting to learn objective C (the 
competitor to C++) so that I can utilize my Macintosh as a development 
platform.  The reason apple used objective C was because Mac OS X is 
really Nextstep which was written in like 1988 or so.

C is not useless when trying to learn C++, although they are different. 
  I do think of C++ as a superset of C, although as someone pointed out 
not a perfect one.  Fans of each language prefer the model of 
programming associated with them.  A C++ programmer almost always like 
object oriented design.  C programmers like structured programming.  
Find out which you like and go that route.

Lucas Holt
Luke at FoolishGames.com
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