Introduction to Robotics: C Programming Basics

Introduction to Robotics 1: Getting Started with C Programming

• This presentation covers fundamental concepts of C programming for robotics applications.
• Key learning objectives include understanding and using C programming variables, data types, conditional statements, escape sequences, and operators.

Target Outcomes

• Students should understand and utilize C programming variables.
• Students should effectively use data types in their C programs..
• Students should have a strong foundation in conditional statements.

What is C Programming?

• C is a general-purpose programming language used in various applications.
• It was developed by Dennis Ritchie in 1972 at Bell Laboratories.
• Primarily designed as a system programming language for the Unix operating system.
• C allows direct access to computer hardware, making it suitable for low-level programming tasks.

C Programming Features

• General purpose and portable
• Low-level memory access
• High speed
• Clean syntax

Variables

• A variable in C is a named memory location that stores data.
• A variable holds data of different types.
• Variables serve as placeholders for data values within a program.

C Variables Syntax

• data_type variable_name = value; (single variable)
• data_type variable_name1, variable_name2; (multiple variables)

Data Types

• Each variable in C has an associated data type.
• Data types define the type of data a variable can hold, and how much memory is allocated for the data.
• C has built-in primitive data types.

Primitive Data Types

• int (integer): Stores whole numbers (positive and negative).
• float (floating point): Stores decimal numbers.
  • Stores single-precision decimal numbers
  • Typically 4 bytes(32bits)
• double (double precision floating point): Stores decimal numbers with higher precision than float.
  • Uses more memory than float (typically 8 bytes)
• char (character): Stores a single character.
  • Typically enclosed in single quotes 'A', 'z'

Data Type Modifiers

• signed: Allows both positive and negative values for integers and characters (default).
• unsigned: Stores only non-negative values.
• short: Reduces the size of an integer variable (usually to 2 bytes).
• long: Increases the size of an integer variable (usually to 8 bytes).

Data Type Usage Summary

• int is for counting, indexing and integer operations.
• float/double are used for values with decimal parts, in scientific calculations, temperature or distance measures etc
• char is used to handle characters and small numbers.

Conditional Statements

• Conditional statements control the flow of program execution based on certain conditions.
• C supports if, if-else, and switch statements.

if Statement

• The simplest form of conditional statement.
• A block of code is executed only if the condition evaluates to true.
• The if statement may be followed by an else block, to execute optional code if condition is false.

if-else Statement

• Executes different code blocks based on whether a condition is true or false.
• Includes an else block that executes if the if condition is false.

else if Ladder

• Used to check multiple conditions sequentially.
• If one condition is false, the program checks the subsequent else if condition. 
• Exits only when a matching condition is found or if none of the conditions match.

switch Statement

• Used when many choices need to be evaluated.
• Each case represents a possible value or condition.
• The default case handles the situation if none of the cases match.
• A break statement is essential in each case to prevent fall-through.

Escape Sequences in C Programming

• Escape sequences are special character combinations used to represent non-printable characters inside strings. e.g \n (newline character),\t (tab character).
• Helpful for formatting and controlling output.
• The \ (backslash) is used to introduce escape sequences, like \n.

Operators in C Programming

• Operators are symbols used for performing operations (calculations, comparisons, and logical operations) on one or more operands.
• Arithmetic operators (+, -, *, /, % etc) are used to perform arithmetic operations
  • Unary plus and minus
  • Increment and decrement
• Relational operators (<, >, <=, >=, ==, !=) are used to make comparisons between values returning true or false.
• Logical operators (&&, ||, !) combine or modify conditions, returning true or false.
• Assignment operators (=, +=, -=, *=, /=, %=, &=, |=, ^=, >>=, <<=) assign values to variables.
• Ternary operators are used as concise expressions to handle conditional statements (if-else).