Editing The C Programming Language (section)

== Influence ==
''The C Programming Language'' has often been cited as a model for [[technical writing]], with reviewers describing it as having clear presentation and concise treatment.  Examples generally consist of complete programs of the type one is likely to encounter in daily use of the language, with an emphasis on [[system programming]].  Its authors wrote,

{{blockquote|We have tried to retain the brevity of the first edition.  C is not a big language, and it is not well served by a big book.  We have improved the exposition of critical features, such as pointers, that are central to C programming.  We have refined the original examples, and have added new examples in several chapters.  For instance, the treatment of complicated declarations is augmented by programs that convert declarations into words and vice versa.  As before, all examples have been tested directly from the text, which is in machine-readable form.|preface to the second edition<ref name="k&r2e">{{cite book |last1= Kernighan |first1= Brian |author-link1= Brian Kernighan |last2= Ritchie |first2= Dennis M. |author-link2= Dennis Ritchie |title= The C Programming Language |edition= 2nd |publisher= [[Prentice Hall]] |date= March 1988 |location= [[Englewood Cliffs, NJ]] |url= https://archive.org/details/cprogramminglang00bria |isbn= 0-13-110362-8 }}</ref>}}
[[File:Hello World Brian Kernighan 1974.jpg|thumb|"Hello, World!" program by Brian Kernighan (1978)]]
The book introduced the [["Hello, World!" program]], which prints only the text "hello, world" as an illustration of a minimal working C program.  Since then, many texts have followed that convention for introducing a programming language.

Before the advent of [[ANSI C]], the first edition of the text served as the ''de facto'' standard of the language for writers of C compilers.  With the standardization of ANSI C, the authors more consciously wrote the second edition for programmers rather than compiler writers, writing,

{{blockquote|Appendix A, the reference manual, is not the standard, but our attempt to convey the essentials of the standard in a smaller space.  It is meant for easy comprehension by programmers, but not as a definition for compiler writers—that role properly belongs to the standard itself.  Appendix B is a summary of the facilities of the standard library.  It too is meant for reference by programmers, not implementers.  Appendix C is a concise summary of the changes from the original version.|preface to the second edition<ref name="k&r2e" />}}

The influence of ''The C Programming Language'' on programmers, a generation of whom first worked with C in universities and industry, has led many to accept the authors' programming style and conventions as recommended practice, if not normative practice.  For example, the coding and formatting style of the programs presented in both editions of the book is often referred to as "[[Indent style#K&R|K&R style]]" or the "One True Brace Style"{{Ambiguous|reason=K&R and OTB aren't the same thing|date=February 2025}} and became the coding style used by convention in the source code for the [[Unix]] and [[Linux]] [[kernel (operating system)|kernels]].