''C'' language : History of "C" language | Why name "C" was given to Language?

Definition & History of "C" Language :
        C is a general-purpose language which has been closely associated with the UNIX operating system for which it was developed - since the system and most of the programs that run it are written in C.

        Many of the important ideas of C stem from the language BCPL, developed by Matrin Richard. The influence of BCPL on C proceeded indirectly through the language B, which was written by Ken Thompson in 1970 at Bell Labs, for the first UNIX system on a  DEC PDP-7. BCPL and B are "type less" languages whereas C provides a variety of data types.

        In 1972 Dennis Ritchie at Bell Labs writes C and in 1978 the publication of The C Programming Language by Kernighan & Ritchie caused a revolution in the computing world.

Dennis Ritchie

Brian Kernighan

        In 1983, the America National Standard Institute (ANSI) established a committee to provide a modern, comprehensive definition of C. The resulting definition, the ANSI standard, or "ANSI C", was completed late 1988.

Why name "C" was given to Language?

• Many of C's principles and ideas were derived from the earlier language B. (Ken Thompson was the developer of B Language.)
• BCPL and CPL are the earlier ancestors of B Language
• CPL is common Programming Language. In 1967, BCPL Language (Basic CPL) was created as a scaled down version of CPL.
• As many of the features were derived from "B" Language that's why it was named as "C".
• After 7-8 years C++ came into existence which was first example of object oriented programming.

C Programming Language Timeline 

If You Want To Know About Basic Structure of "C" Program. Click here...