C vs. Java — What's the Difference?

Lacks built-in support for OOP but can be structured to use modules and function pointers.

More error-proof due to managed environment, but with additional overhead.

Compiled directly into machine language, which provides high execution speed.

Features garbage collection for memory management, simplifying development.

C, or c, is the third letter in the English and ISO basic Latin alphabets. Its name in English is cee (pronounced ), plural cees.

Supports multithreading natively with built-in language support, enhancing its capability to handle concurrent operations effectively.

The third letter of the alphabet.

Java (Indonesian: Jawa, Indonesian pronunciation: [ˈdʒawa]; Javanese: ꦗꦮ; Sundanese: ᮏᮝ) is one of the islands of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia, bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea on the north. With a population of 147.7 million (Java only) or 151.8 million (including the inhabitants of its surrounding islands, principally Madura), Java constitutes 56.1 percent of the Indonesian population and is the world's most-populous major island.

A shape like that of a letter C

A general-purpose computer programming language designed to produce programs that will run on any computer system.

The first note of the diatonic scale of C major, the major scale having no sharps or flats.

A large island in the Malay Archipelago, forming part of Indonesia; population 120,000,000 (est. 2008) (with Madura).

The Roman numeral for 100.

Brewed coffee.

A computer programming language originally developed for implementing the Unix operating system.

A blend of coffee imported from the island of Java.

A widely used programming language.

Coffee in general.

The third letter of the modern English alphabet.

A dance popular in France in the early 20th century.

Any of the speech sounds represented by the letter c.

One of the islands of the Malay Archipelago belonging to the Netherlands.

The third in a series.

Java coffee, a kind of coffee brought from Java.

Something shaped like the letter C.

An object-oriented computer programming language, derived largely from C++, used widely for design and display of web pages on the world-wide web. It is an interpreted language, and has been suggested as a platform-independent code to allow execution of the same progam under multiple operating systems without recompiling. The language is still (1997) under active development, and is evolving.

C The third best or third highest in quality or rank

An island in Indonesia south of Borneo; one of the world's most densely populated regions

The first tone in the scale of C major or the third tone in the relative minor scale.

A beverage consisting of an infusion of ground coffee beans;

A key or scale in which the tone of C is the tonic.

A simple platform-independent object-oriented programming language used for writing applets that are downloaded from the World Wide Web by a client and run on the client's machine

A written or printed note representing this tone.

An object-oriented programming language designed to be portable and accessible, with a syntax based on C++ but with simplified memory management.

A string, key, or pipe tuned to the pitch of this tone.

Runs on the Java Virtual Machine, which allows it to operate across various operating systems without modification.

A widely used object-oriented programming language based on C.

Alternative form of c.

Alternative form of c.

C is the third letter of the English alphabet. It is from the Latin letter C, which in old Latin represented the sounds of k, and g (in go); its original value being the latter. In Anglo-Saxon words, or Old English before the Norman Conquest, it always has the sound of k. The Latin C was the same letter as the Greek

The keynote of the normal or "natural" scale, which has neither flats nor sharps in its signature; also, the third note of the relative minor scale of the same.

As a numeral, C stands for Latin centum or 100, CC for 200, etc.

A degree on the Centigrade scale of temperature

The speed at which light travels in a vacuum; the constancy and universality of the speed of light is recognized by defining it to be exactly 299,792,458 meters per second

One of the four nucleotides used in building DNA; all four nucleotides have a common phosphate group and a sugar (ribose)

A base found in DNA and RNA and derived from pyrimidine; pairs with guanine

An abundant nonmetallic tetravalent element occurring in three allotropic forms: amorphous carbon and graphite and diamond; occurs in all organic compounds

Ten 10s

A unit of electrical charge equal to the amount of charge transferred by a current of 1 ampere in 1 second

A general-purpose programing language closely associated with the UNIX operating system

The 3rd letter of the Roman alphabet

Street names for cocaine

Being ten more than ninety

A procedural programming language developed in 1972, known for its efficiency and close system control.

Requires manual memory management.

Minimal runtime required, making it suitable for low-resource environments.

Java code is compiled into bytecode, which can be executed on any device with a JVM, making it independent of underlying hardware.

While possible, Java is not typically used for system programming due to its abstraction from hardware and overhead of the JVM.

C requires manual error checks and handling, while Java uses exceptions which provide a more robust and manageable error handling mechanism.

Garbage collection introduces some overhead and can affect performance, particularly in latency-sensitive applications, though it simplifies memory management.

C compiles directly to machine code, accessing hardware resources directly without the abstraction layer of a virtual machine, resulting in faster execution.

Java provides built-in support for multithreading within the language, making it easier to manage than C, which requires external libraries for threading.

Java provides more built-in security features through the JVM, including array bounds checking and explicit security management, whereas C relies on the programmer to implement security measures manually.

Some IDEs support both, like Eclipse and NetBeans, but others are more specialized to a particular language's ecosystem.

Yes, C remains highly relevant in fields that require close hardware interaction, high performance, or are resource-constrained.

If the application needs to run on multiple platforms without modification, Java is typically preferred. If performance on a specific platform is critical, C might be better.

C is often used in embedded systems, operating systems, and high-performance applications, while Java is favored for enterprise software, mobile applications, and large systems with robust cross-platform needs.

For C, focus on system programming and computer science fundamentals; for Java, object-oriented design and application development courses are recommended.

Java typically benefits from robust IDEs with advanced debugging and development tools, while C environments are often less integrated but highly efficient for system-level programming.