Operators and Expressions

Abstract

Operators are the verbs of the C language that let you calculate values. C’s rich set of operators is one of its distinguishing characteristics. You have already seen a number of C operators in the preceding chapters, such as + (addition), / (division), < (less than), and = (assignment). The operator symbols are composed of one or more special characters. If an operator consists of more than one character, you must enter the characters without any intervening spaces:

$$\begin{array}{*{20}{c}} {{\text{x}}\;\; < {\text{ = }}\;\;{\text{y}}}&{/*\;{\text{ legal expression }}\;*/} \\ {{\text{x}}\;\; < \;{\text{ = }}\;{\text{ y}}}&{/*\;{\text{ illegal expression }}\;*/} \end{array}$$

In this chapter, we take another look at the previously mentioned operators and introduce some new ones. We also describe expressions in greater detail.

We must either institute conventional forms of expression or else pretend that we have nothing to express. — George Santayana, Soliloquies in England