C is still, by far, the simplest language that we have.

Although many newer languages are safer (with the exclusion of Rust, primarily by being slower) the same kinds of issues that are there in C are there in these languages, their effects are just harder to see.

People complain about C as though they know how to fix it.

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simonask 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

C is not a simple language in the sense that writing software in C is simple, and I think that's the only useful way to understand the word "simple" in this context.

Brainfuck is "simple" by any other definition as well, but that's not a useful quality.

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spacedcowboy an hour ago | parent [-]

C is a far simpler language than, for example, Swift. It's cognitive load in order to actually write something is pretty small - even the authors state that their book about C is intentionally slim because the concepts to understand are not that many.

That doesn't mean the C is a safer language than Swift, or a less-capable language than Swift. But in terms of "easy to understand along the happy-path", it's a lot easier to get going in C.

Swift, for example, bakes a whole load of CS-degree-level ideas and concepts into the basic language with its optionals, unwrapping, type-inference, async/await, existential types, ... ... ... . C doesn't do any of that. There are (many!) more footguns in C, but the language is less complex as a result.

Brainfuck is not at all simple, from that point of view. This is a valid Brainfuck program:

++++++++[>++++[>++>+++>+++>+<<<<-]>+>+>->>+[<]<-]>>.>---.+++++++..+++.>>.<-.<.+++.------.--------.>>+.>++.

This is a valid C program

#include <stdio.h> int main() { printf("Hello\n"); }

One of these is far simpler than the other.

	▲	simonask 23 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		The point I'm getting at is that your definition of "simple" (a word that should be banned among programmers) is not useful, if it is even meaningful. The brainfuck example is "simpler": Only 8 kinds of tokens! Not really useful, though. The cognitive load of _actually delivering software_ written in C is immensely greater than doing so with Swift, or Rust, or Python, or Java, even Zig, despite all of those leveraging much heavier machinery in order to deliver a friendlier abstract model for you to program against. The tragedy of C is that, in addition only delivering very baseline abstraction tools, it also adds its own set of seemingly arbitrary rules and requirements that come from nowhere but the C standard. Fictitious limitations to suit a bygone era. The abstract model of C is fine in some places, but definitely not fine in other places, and my hypothesis is that most UB in practice comes from a mismatch between programmer intuitions and C's idiosyncracies.

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dns_snek 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Can you elaborate what do you think C has in terms of simplicity that Zig doesn't, and which "same kinds of issues" do you think it has?

I'm not an expert in either language but my anecdotal experience disagrees with this - writing Zig has been far simpler and less error-prone than writing C.