Identifiers are user-defined names (with a sequence of letters and digits) given to the variables, arrays, functions, structures, unions, etc.

For example: In terms of computers, it uses a range of addresses to identify the data. But as a programmer, we can’t get those addresses before program execution. so rather than using addresses, we use identifiers.

Rules of identifiers :

In order to remove the ambiguity during the compilation process, C creators imposed a set of rules on identifiers. They are :

  • The first character must start with a letter (A to Z) or (a to z) or with an underscore (_).
  • An identifier should contain only letters (A to Z) or (a-z) or digits (0 to 9) or an underscore (_).
  • Identifiers are case-sensitive i.e.  “EXAMPLE“, “example“, “Example“, “eXample” are four different identifiers.
  • Identifiers should not contain any ‘special characters‘ & ‘white space characters‘ except underscore.

Special characters

Whitespace characters

Keywords are not allowed to use as identifiers because keywords are reserved words.

Valid identifiers:

  • _dataoverride
  • c_tutorials1
  • jamesbond007
  • Final__Example

Invalid identifiers:

  • 123example
  • @example2
  • data override
  • float (It is invalid because the float is a keyword)

Refer “page 192  section A2.3  Identifiers” in “The C programming language by Dennis M Ritchie & Brian W. Kernighan”

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