[3] Another Bell Labs employee, Brian Kernighan, had written the first C tutorial,[4] and he persuaded Ritchie to coauthor a book on the language.

[5] Kernighan would write most of the book's "expository" material, and Ritchie's reference manual became its appendices.

"[9] The C Programming Language has often been cited as a model for technical writing, with reviewers describing it as having clear presentation and concise treatment.

Before the advent of ANSI C, the first edition of the text served as the de facto standard of the language for writers of C compilers.

It is meant for easy comprehension by programmers, but not as a definition for compiler writers—that role properly belongs to the standard itself.

Appendix C is a concise summary of the changes from the original version.The influence of The C Programming Language on programmers, a generation of whom first worked with C in universities and industry, has led many to accept the authors' programming style and conventions as recommended practice, if not normative practice.