With C you need to pay attention to things like manual memory management which aren't necessary with other languages or to understand the material.

Aye but these lads are building a compiler. Probably shouldn't hide things like 'memory management' at the introduction stage as use of memory is inherent to all computing and programming.

Sure, that makes sense, but you can write a compiler in languages that don't require it themselves. That's what I meant.

> Sure, that makes sense, but you can write a compiler in languages that don't require it themselves.

I don't follow your rationale. With C the developer manages heap memory by basically calling malloc and free.

This means that once you have the memory model set, all you need to do to roll your compiler is to implement the interface.

A language that "don't require it themselves" is a language which provides only high level constructs and dumps all the memory management logic to the compiler/runtime, from object allocation/deallocation to lifetime management.

How is that simpler to pull off by a compiler writer?

The target language generally has nothing to do with the language of the compiler, where automatic memory management is just as useful (and also helps to minimize the amount of unrelated technical detail) as anywhere else.

Manual memory management is optional. IIRC some version of the D compiler was written assuming an infinite virtual address space (basically they just did not bother calling free() ever)!

There's a chapter in the book dedicated to memory layout of programs that discusses program segments, paging, implementation of malloc/free, etc that is more or less required before getting to the assembler and codegen stages.

Even if you can write a compiler assuming infinite memory that generates programs that also assume it, it would be a disservice to readers to ignore that for brevity. It's an important part of understanding how programs are created.

Is that why D is so prevalent among (some) quant shops?

Yes. Pseudocode is better for teaching than C. Plus, translating pseudocode into a language of choice is a good exercise.

Another good idea is to write a compiler in the target language.

Pseudocode can be easy to understand but you (also) need a real language to cement your understanding of the subject.

> you (also) need a real language to cement your understanding of the subject.

That's why I'd like to use a language that I already know instead of learning a new one while also learning new material.

Well you can. If you understand the algorithm you can write it in any language you know. Additionally, C is at basic level just loops, conditionals and function calls so it will be easy to translate from it if you need to. And then there are other books using other languages out there and people can choose.

It is also manual memory management, lack of generics, of polymorphism, and what not else. Even C++ would be a better choice.

Basic C is not that hard. Probably one of the easiest languages to get into.

Sure, but it’s a hard language to write good code in.