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C - Basic Syntax

This document discusses the basic syntax of the C programming language. It covers tokens, semicolons, comments, identifiers, keywords, and whitespace in C programs. Tokens are the basic building blocks and can be keywords, identifiers, constants, strings, or symbols. Semicolons terminate statements in C. Comments describe code and are ignored by the compiler. Identifiers name variables and functions and cannot include punctuation. Keywords are reserved words that cannot be used as names. Whitespace separates elements of a statement to help the compiler.

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102 views3 pages

C - Basic Syntax

This document discusses the basic syntax of the C programming language. It covers tokens, semicolons, comments, identifiers, keywords, and whitespace in C programs. Tokens are the basic building blocks and can be keywords, identifiers, constants, strings, or symbols. Semicolons terminate statements in C. Comments describe code and are ignored by the compiler. Identifiers name variables and functions and cannot include punctuation. Keywords are reserved words that cannot be used as names. Whitespace separates elements of a statement to help the compiler.

Uploaded by

Marcelo Luna
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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C - Basic Syntax

You have seen the basic structure of a C program, so it will be easy to understand other basic
building blocks of the C programming language.

Tokens in C
A C program consists of various tokens and a token is either a keyword, an identifier, a
constant, a string literal, or a symbol. For example, the following C statement consists of five
tokens −

printf("Hello, World! \n");

The individual tokens are −

printf
(
"Hello, World! \n"
)
;

Semicolons
In a C program, the semicolon is a statement terminator. That is, each individual statement
must be ended with a semicolon. It indicates the end of one logical entity.

Given below are two different statements −

printf("Hello, World! \n");


return 0;

Comments
Comments are like helping text in your C program and they are ignored by the compiler. They
start with /* and terminate with the characters */ as shown below −

/* my first program in C */

You cannot have comments within comments and they do not occur within a string or
character literals.

Identifiers

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A C identifier is a name used to identify a variable, function, or any other user-defined item.
An identifier starts with a letter A to Z, a to z, or an underscore '_' followed by zero or more
letters, underscores, and digits (0 to 9).

C does not allow punctuation characters such as @, $, and % within identifiers. C is a case-
sensitive programming language. Thus, Manpower and manpower are two different
identifiers in C. Here are some examples of acceptable identifiers −

mohd zara abc move_name a_123


myname50 _temp j a23b9 retVal

Keywords
The following list shows the reserved words in C. These reserved words may not be used as
constants or variables or any other identifier names.

auto else long switch

break enum register typedef

case extern return union

char float short unsigned

const for signed void

continue goto sizeof volatile

default if static while

do int struct _Packed

double

Whitespace in C
A line containing only whitespace, possibly with a comment, is known as a blank line, and a C
compiler totally ignores it.

Whitespace is the term used in C to describe blanks, tabs, newline characters and
comments. Whitespace separates one part of a statement from another and enables the
compiler to identify where one element in a statement, such as int, ends and the next element
begins. Therefore, in the following statement −

int age;

there must be at least one whitespace character (usually a space) between int and age for
the compiler to be able to distinguish them. On the other hand, in the following statement −

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fruit = apples + oranges; // get the total fruit

no whitespace characters are necessary between fruit and =, or between = and apples,
although you are free to include some if you wish to increase readability.

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