What Is Code?

Table of contents

• Definition
• Use Cases and Examples
• Summary

Definition

In simple words, code is a set of instructions written down using a programming language [→], meant to be processed by a computer.

Use Cases and Examples

When a programmer writes a "Hello, World!" program in the C programming language, the code looks like this:

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01: #include <stdio.h>
02: int main() 
03: {
04:    printf("Hello, World!");
05:    return 0;
06: }

Similarly, the code for writing a "Hello, World!" program in the Java programming language looks like this:

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01: class HelloWorld 
02: {
03:     public static void main(String[] args) 
04: {
05:         System.out.println("Hello, World!"); 
06:     }
07: }

This is saved in a text file-like file usually with a special extension at the end of the file, for example, our C program above can be saved as hello_word.c.

Another alternative term used for code in the programming world is source code [→]. Usually, software developers will reserve the term source code to mean a group of "code files" that make up a piece of software and use the term code to just refer to one file or a line of instruction.

Summary

Also, the act of writing software is sometimes referred to as coding.

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