How do I practice Unix programming in C?

Question

After five years of professional Java (and to a lesser extent, Python) programming and slowly feeling my computer science education slip away, I decided I wanted to broaden my h

Answer 1

Here are a few stackoverflow postings discussing C/Unix programming books. Their main claim to fame is extensive fan-out to other resources.

Practice some of the idioms (understand the ins and outs of pointers etc) and pick projects that help with that. The third item in the list has an answer (disclaimer, I wrote it) with a bunch of high-level C idioms where an idiomatic C program would differ from Java.

Learning XLib or Win32 GUI programming with C is probably less useful as almost anything is better than C for GUI programming and wrapping a core C engine with another language is generally much easier - unless you're really concerned with speed. As a starting point, concentrate on 'systems' programming applications, which is where you are most likely to get real mileage from C. Learn how the C interface of one of the scripting languages like Tcl or Python works.

Writing some bit-twiddly and pointer heavy code (e.g. picking apart network packets or interpreting a protocol), or server-side items using sockets will take you right into C's core competencies. If you've got some of the WRS books, try making pthreads work (IIRC UNP2 has a big section about pThreads). For a contrast, write something that uses non-blocking I/O. This stuff is C's home turf and you'll get a good working knowledge of C by doing this. Troll through the RFCs for some ideas of network protocols to implement.

• What are good Linux/Unix books for an advancing user?
• What are some good resources for learning C beyond K&R
• Resources for learning C program design
• What’s a good way to start learning about Data Structures & Algorithms?
• Algorithms in C

Answer 2

Write a webserver.

• Make it multi-threaded.

• Have it support a new scripting language you develop (a la PHP, etc.)

• Allow uploads from authenticated users.

• Write a plugin for your favorite tool (i.e. integrate with SVN to give a webview).

Answer 3

This is pretty interesting. As we know that Unix is designed by using the C language, it may not difficult to learn. If you are using the Windows OS, you can use a "Windows services for Unix" application to practice your programs. If you are using Unix, then we can use editors like vi.

Answer 4

I would recommend one thing highly.

Try and re-write all usual Linux command lines tools like ls, mkdir, cd etc.

You'll gain a lot of knowlege about programming and Linux both at the same time.

Pick the commands from the easiest, say "time" and work all the way up to the more complicated ones.

Answer 5

The best way to consolidate your learnings it to practise. So just choose a kind of application that interest you and start developing it (for example, a network client/server simple application).

Try to test most of the Unix APIs (files, sockets, etc.) to see how they work. You could for example get an Unix programming book, follow its chapters and test on your application everything you read, by creating your own functions. On that way, you can start to develop your own function library to be used in further projects.

Answer 6

Reinvent a lot of the core Unix utilities. Most of these were (and still are) written in C, so they are a good way to start off learning. Depending on your skill, pick harder or easier utilities to copy.

Try writing your own malloc. You'll learn a lot about Unix and a lot of C programming as well.

Google for computer science operating system courses and do the projects there. Many schools have these projects on public websites so you could get everything you need. Here is a link to Purdue's site. Give the shell project a shot; it was difficult, but really educational.