Flavors of C

If you're a programmer, chances are that you've heard of the C programming language, or more specifically, ANSI C. ANSI C is a standardized programming language, which means that each version has an official standard definition, specified in a long and complex document. Currently there are several different versions of ANSI C, starting at C89 and going up to C17.

There are also many different dialects, flavors, and variants of C (I use "flavor" here to refer to languages which aren't called C, but are very similar). Many languages are called "C-like", such as Java, D, JavaScript, and so on, because they share a general similarity to C. There are also more obscure "flavors" of C, which look a lot like C but with some extra flourishes. In fact, the Go programming language is descended from those "C-flavors", due to its rather interesting history.

I'll be exploring a few of these C-flavors in subsequent blog posts. Here are a few which I hope to investigate:

  1. Plan 9 C
  2. HolyC
  3. C--
  4. Alef
  5. Limbo

That's all for now.