What are the problems of a C compiler?

Every programming language has some advantages and disadvantages which are not present in the other languages. Some languages are capable of solving some problems better as compared to other languages. But the point is that most of the problems have similar needs, requirements and logic, so the point where languages differ from each other is the efficiency with which they solve the problem.

Some provide more efficient and fluent solutions while others don’t. As we all know C is a basic programming language which was developed to solve problems and develop programs relating to kernels of the operating systems, compilers and graphical user interfaces. C compiler though being fast is not so efficient. It provides many downsides for a large number of problems. Many of us think that C is the fastest language but this is not true.

C++ compiles most of the C programs at the same speed as C++ does. Some of the features of C language like virtual function calls result in over heads. C is not object oriented. This in turn makes it more inconvenient to implement some programs. It is not able to force object orientation everywhere. C makes some programs that require object oriented programming more error prone. C has got a weak typing system as compared to other programming languages. This leads to many programming errors after compilation of the program.

A bigger standard library C++ allows the full use of the C standard library. This is very important of course, as the C standard library is an invaluable resource when writing real world programs.
- C++ has a library called the Standard Template Library.
- This standard library contains a number of templates that can be used while developing programs almost of any kind.
- It also includes many common data structures which are very useful like data lists, maps, data sets, etc. the standard library routines and its data structures are tailored to the specific needs of the programmer.
- Though standard library is no gold knife, still it does gives a great help in many programs for solving general purpose related problems. Many tasks like implementing a linked list in C take a lot of time.
- Though the compilation is fast but, who has got that much time to write those lengthy codes. That time you will feel the need for a better compiler which provides a shorter and effective code for implementing lists and other sorts of data structures in array form.

Even though C language was standardized long back in 1998, but till date we don’t have any good compilers for this language. It’s a very complex language and so requires a heavy compiler like itself to compile it. Another problem related to C compiling is that being a big and complex language, many few people have its correct knowledge of usage. A lot depends on the programmer also. If you are typing in the wrong code you are sure to get bad results.
Today also most of the programs are written in C. a need is felt to convert them to another programming language for better compilation. But the conversion is no good solution. Conversion of a C language program code is often ended up in rewriting almost the entire content of the program.

Programs written in C will always have 2 major problems. Firstly their code will be unusually lengthy and time consuming. Secondly, the program execution will be slower even though the compilation time is very less. The C program codes require more time to read, write and understand. C compiler being ineffective can crash any time. There’s a lack of high level routines in C compiler.