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awesome-c

A curated list of C good stuff. This list contains only free software for code, and sellers who aren't evil for physical resources.

LOOKING FOR MAINTAINERS: This list is currently pretty much inactive. I'm looking for maintainers that can make it great again. See #26 for more info, but the process is simple: add or fix a couple of things in this list and you'll become a contributor to a 850+ stars list.

This list was previously maintained by @kozross. He decided to switch the list to a new platform, so I've decided to fork it so we could keep it on GitHub.

Build Systems
Compilers
Compiler libraries
Compression
Crypto
Database
Deep Learning
Documentation Generation
Editors
Embedded Systems
- RTOS
Environments
Frameworks
Game Programming
- Engines
- Resources
Generic Programming
Graphics
- Graphic APIs
Graphical User Interface
Hashing
Image Processing
JSON
Learning, Reference and Tutorials
- Online
- Physical
Macros
Memory Allocators
Multimedia
Networking and Internet
- Web Frameworks
Numerical
Parallel Programming
Parsers
Regex
Serialization
Source Code Collections
Standard Libraries
String Manipulation
Testing
Text Editor Extensions
- Atom
- Emacs
- Vim
Tools
Utilities
XML

Build Systems

These are tools to automate the building and testing of projects in C.

aimake - Build tool designed to avoid complex configurations. GNU GPL3 or later
Autoconf - Extensible package of M4 macros that produce shell scripts to automatically configure software source code packages. Part of the Autotools. GNU GPL3 or later
Automake - Tool for automatically generating Makefile.in files compliant with the GNU Coding Standards. Requires the use of Autoconf. Part of the Autotools. GNU GPL3 or later
CMake - Tools for cross-platform building, testing, and packaging. 3-clause BSD
Jam - Build system, designed to be easier than make. Understands C build rules implicitly. Jam License
Libtool - Generic library support script. Part of the Autotools. GNU GPL3 or later
Meson - Extremely fast, user-friendly build system. Based on Ninja. Apache 2.0
Premake - Build script generator for toolsets like Visual Studio, Xcode, or GNU Make. 3-clause BSD
SCons - An easier, more reliable and faster way to build software. MIT
Ninja - Small, simple build system with a focus on speed. Apache 2.0
Bazel - Build system for various operating systems and targets. Apache 2.0
Buck - Build system created and used by Facebook. Apache 2.0
Qbs - Modern build tool for software projects. LGPL3
qmake - Build system included with the Qt Framework. GNU GPL3 with Qt Exception
xmake - Cross-platform build utility based on lua. Apache 2.0

Compilers

Clang - C compiler for LLVM. Supports C11. NCSA
CompCert - Fully-verified C compiler. Supports almost all of C89. GNU GPL2.1 or later
GCC - Provides a C compiler as part of its compiler set. Supports C11 and OpenMP. GNU GPL3 or later
PCC - Venerable C compiler. Supports C99. Various free licenses
TCC - Tiny C Compiler; a small, fast C compiler. Supports C99 (except complex types). GNU LGPL2.1
Intel SPMD - Compiler for a variant of the C language, for single program, multiple data programming. Various licenses
ccache - Compiler cache designed to speedup recompilation. GNU GPL3 or later

Compiler libraries

Libraries for use in compilers, interpreters, and low-level based projects.

yasm - Yasm Modular Assembler Project. 2-clause BSD

Compression

libzip - A C library for reading, creating, and modifying zip archives. 3-clause BSD
lzo - Very fast data compression library. GNU GPL2.1
zlib - Massively-spiffy yet delicately-unobtrusive compression library. 3-clause BSD
bzip2 - Patent free, high quality data compressor. 3-clause BSD
lz4 - Fast Compression algorithm.
snappy - Fast compression library (implementation in C++, native bindings to C).
zstd - Fast real-time compression algorithm 3-clause BSD
brotli - Generic lossless compression algorithm based on LZ77, Huffman coding and 2nd order context modelling MIT
quicklz - Fast compression library. GNU GPL2.1
pixz - Pixz (pronounced pixie) is a parallel, indexing version of xz. 2-clause BSD

Crypto

GnuTLS - Secure communication library, implementing SSL, TLS and DTLS. GNU LGPL2.1 or later
libgcrypt - General-purpose cryptography library, with a range of available ciphers. GNU LGPL2.1or later (code) and GNU GPL2.1 or later (manual and tools)
OpenSSL - Implementation of the SSL and TLS protocols, and also includes a cryptography library. Dual Licensed under the OpenSSL License and the SSLeay License
libsodium - Modern and easy-to-use crypto library. Expat
libtomcrypt - Fairly comprehensive, modular and portable cryptographic toolkit. Public Domain
mbed TLS - Another crypto implementation for C. Apache 2.0
libressl - Modernized fork of OpenSSL. Various Licenses

Database

This lists databases and data stores with C APIs.

BerkeleyDB - Library for a high-performance embedded database for key-value data. GNU AGPLv3
Hiredis - Minimalistic client library for Redis. 3-clause BSD
LMDB - Ultra-fast, ultra-compact key-value embedded data store. OpenLDAP License
MariaDB - Robust, scalable and reliable SQL server, designed to be a drop-in replacement for MySQL. 3-clause BSD
mongo-c-driver - High-performance client library for MongoDB. Apache 2.0
PostgreSQL - Powerful object-relational database system. PostgreSQL licence
recutils - Set of tools and a C library for accessing human-editable, plaintext database files called recfiles. GNU GPL3 or later
Redis - Advanced key-value store. 3-clause BSD
sophia - Modern, embeddable key-value database. FreeBSD
SQLite - Self-contained, serverless, zero-configuration, transactional SQL database engine with a C interface. Public Domain
UnQLite - Self-contained, serverless, zero-configuration, transactional NoSQL engine with a C interface. FreeBSD

Deep Learning

Darknet - Open source neural network framework written in C and CUDA. It is fast, easy to install, and supports CPU and GPU computation.

Documentation Generation

Cxref - Generates documentation of C programs in either LaTeX, HTML, RTF or SGML. GNU GPL2.1
DocOnce - Modestly-tagged markup language that can be used to generate a range of formats. 3-clause BSD
Doxygen - The de-facto standard tool for generating C documentation from annotated sources. Can generate a large range of formats. GNU GPL2.1
GTK-Doc - Tool for generating C documentation from annotated sources. Has support for the Autotools. GNU GPL2.1 (code) or GNU FDL1.1

Editors

These are specifically fancier, IDE-type editors. If you want a programmer's text editor, look elsewhere. Besides, whatever choice you make most likely supports C anyway.

Anjuta DevStudio - The GNOME IDE. GNU GPL2.1
Atom - Hackable text editor for the 21st century. MIT
Code::Blocks - Extensible, configurable IDE supporting C. GNU GPL3
CodeLite - Cross-platform IDE. GNU GPL2.1
Eclipse - IDE written in Java. EPL
Geany - Very small and fast IDE. GNU GPL2.1 or later
KDevelop - The KDE IDE. GNU GPL2.1
Qt Creator - Cross-platform IDE written with C++ and Qt, part of the Qt SDK. Supports Clang Code Model. GNU GPL3 with Qt exception
Visual Studio Code - Code editing, redefined. Visual Studio Code.

Embedded Systems

These are projects that allow one to work with microcontrollers and other resource constrained architectures.

RTOS

A real-time operating system (RTOS) is intended to serve real-time applications that process data with low latency delay.

Amazon FreeRTOS - RTOS for microcontrollers that makes small, low-power edge devices easy to program. MIT
ChibiOS - RTOS with complete development environment (HAL, drivers, support files, and tools). Various Licenses
Contiki - Connect low-cost, low power microcontrollers to the Internet. 3-clause BSD
Zephyr Project - Scalable real-time RTOS supporting multiple hardware architectures, optimized for resource constrained devices. Apache 2.0
RIOT OS - Real-time multi-threading operating system that supports a range of devices that are typically found in the Internet of Things. LGPL-2.1

Environments

This is a list of technologies designed to bring Windows into the 21st century with respect to support for C.

Cygwin - Designed to emulate a POSIX-compatible environment extensively under Windows. Various Licenses
MinGW-w64 - Minimalist environment for C development on Windows with 64 bit support. Various Licenses

Frameworks

This section has big libraries that provide data structures and other stuff you expect of a 'modern' standard library.

APR - Apache Portable Runtime; another library of cross-platform utility functions. Apache 2.0
C Algorithms - Collection of common algorithms and data structures for C. ISC
C Macro Collections - Header only, macro generated, generic and type-safe Collections in C. MIT
CPL - The Common Pipeline Library; a set of libraries designed to be a comprehensive, efficient and robust software toolkit. GNU GPL2.1
EFL - Large collection of useful data structures and functions.
GLib - Library of utility functions and structures, designed to be portable, efficient and powerful. GNU LGPL2.1
GIO - Modern and easy-to-use VFS API. GNU LGPL2.1
GObject - Object-oriented system and object model for C. GNU LGPL2.1
libnih - Lightweight library of C functions and structures. GNU GPL2.1
libU - Small library of basic utilities, including memory allocation, string manipulation and logging. 3-clause BSD
PBL - Large library of utilities, featuring data structures, among other things. GNU LGPL2.1 or later (library) or GNU GPL2.1 or later (test code)
qlibc - Simple and powerful C library, designed as a replacement for GLib while focusing on being small and light. qLib license (similar to FreeBSD)
stb - Range of single-file libraries for C. Public Domain
libsrt - Safe Real-Time library for C. 3-clause BSD

Game Programming

Engines

These are provided as examples of C game programming code.

Corange - Game engine in pure C. FreeBSD
Darkplaces - Modified version of the Quake2 engine. GNU GPL2.1
ioquake3 - The Quake3 engine, freed at last. GNU GPL2.1
Orx - Portable, lightweight, plugin-based, data-driven, 2D-oriented game engine. zlib
Quake - The Quake engine. GNU GPL2.1
Quake2 - The Quake2 engine. GNU GPL2.1
Spearmint - Engine designed for FPS games. GNU GPL3 or later

Resources

These are libraries of all sorts that are useful for game programming.

Allegro - Cross-platform, video game development and multimedia library. zlib
Chipmunk2D - Fast and lightweight 2D game physics library. Expat
CSFML - Binding for SFML in C. zlib
FreeGLUT - Alternative to the OpenGL Utility Toolkit. Allows the creation and management of windows with OpenGL contexts. X11
GLFW - Multi-platform library for creating windows with OpenGL contexts. zlib
libao - Cross-platform audio library with a wide variety of outputs. GNU GPL2.1 or later
RetroArch - The reference frontend for libretro. GNU GPL3
SDL and SDL2 - Cross-platform development library designed to provide low-level access to audio, keyboard, mouse, joystick and graphics hardware via OpenGL. SDL2 is the most current version. zlib
raylib - Simple and easy-to-use library to learn videogames programming. zlib

Generic Programming

klib - Small and lightweight implementations of common algorithms and data structures. MIT

Graphics

Cairo -2D graphics library. GNU LGPL2.1 or MPLv1.1
Cogl - GPU graphics and utilities API. Expat
Clutter - UI library based on OpenGL. GNU LGPL2.1
giflib - Library for reading and writing gif images. MIT
heman - Tiny library of image utilities dealing with height maps, normal maps, distance fields and the like. Expat
libcaca - ASCII renderer for terminal-based interfaces. WTFPLv2
libimagequant - Small, portable library for high-quality conversion of RGBA images to 8-bit indexed colour images. FreeBSD
libjpeg-turbo - Faster library for reading and writing JPEG files. Various Licenses
libpng - The official PNG reference library. libpng license
libxmi - Function library for rasterizing 2D vector graphics. GNU GPL3 or later
mozjpeg - Improved JPEG encoder. 3-clause BSD

Graphic APIs

OpenGL - Industry adopted 2D and 3D graphics API. More resources at awesome-opengl.
OpenGL ES - Industry adopted 2D and 3D graphics API for mobile and embedded devices.
OpenGL SC - Graphic and compute standard for industry requiring system safety certification.
Vulkan - Explicit graphic and compute API for modern cross-platform development. More resources at awesome-vulkan.

Graphical User Interface

These are specifically widget toolkits.

GTK+ - Cross-platform widget toolkit. GNU LGPL2.1
IUP - Another cross-platform widget toolkit. Expat
Tk - Basic widget toolkit. Part of Tcl/Tk. Tcl/Tk License
XForms Toolkit - Widget toolkit designed for the XWindow system. GNU LGPL2.1
nuklear - Single-header ANSI C gui library. Public Domain
libui - Simple and portable (but not inflexible) GUI library. MIT
LCUI - Small C library for building user interfaces with C, XML and CSS. MIT

Hashing

All hashing related libraries, cryptographic or not.

jwHash - Fast hashtable implementation. Apache 2.0
xxHash - Extremely fast non-cryptographic hash algorithm. 2-clause BSD
libcrc - Multi platform CRC library. MIT
murmur - C implementation of MurMur Hashing. Public Domain
t1ha - Fast Positive Hash library. zlib

Image Processing

libccv - Modern Computer Vision Library. 3-clause BSD

JSON

Jansson - C library for encoding, decoding and manipulating JSON. Expat
jsmn - Minimalistic JSON parser. Expat
json-c - Library for working with JSON. Expat
parson - Lightweight JSON library written in C. MIT
WJElement - Advanced JSON manipulation library, with support for JSON Schema. LGPL, any version
YAJL - Fast C JSON streaming parser library. ISC

Learning, Reference and Tutorials

This is a list of resources for learning C programming in general, or something useful relating to C programming.

Online

Reference

Language Standards

Beginner

Tutorial on pointers
Building C Projects
C Programming Wikibook
Introduction to 'fun' C
Learning C with GDB
POSIX Threads Programming tutorial (a little dated, but most of it is still valid and useful)
The GNU C Programming Tutorial (online PDF)
Templating in C

Intermediate

Advanced

Self-study courses

C Programming Language Certified Associate preparation course

Physical

Reference

C: A Reference Manual 5E - Full reference book for C99.
C Pocket Reference - Concise reference book for C99.
The C Programming Language 2E - The original book on C, by its creators.

Beginner

C Primer Plus 6E - Complete tutorial on programming in C11.
C Programming: A Modern Approach - Excellent book to learn the basics of C.
Head First C - 'Head-first' style book for learning C.

Intermediate

21st Century C - Very good second programming book on C.
Understanding and Using C Pointers - In-depth resource on pointers in C.
ZeroMQ - Book for using ZeroMQ with C.

Advanced

Expert C Programming: Deep C Secrets - Interesting, in-depth and entertaining look at the innards of C.

Macros

P99 - Suite of macros to implement advanced features like default function arguments, scope-bound resources, etc. (Requires C99) Q Public License

Memory Allocators

Implementations of memory allocators for various systems and platforms.

jemalloc - General purpose malloc(3) implementation that emphasizes fragmentation avoidance and scalable concurrency support, commonly used in production systems. FreeBSD
dlmalloc - Doug Lea's malloc(3) implementation, useful for academic and research purposes. Public Domain
Hoard - A Fast, Scalable, and Memory-efficient Malloc for Linux, Windows, Mac, and Solaris. GNU GPL2
nedmalloc - An EXTREMELY FAST portable thread caching malloc(3) implementation written in C. GNU GPL2
rpmalloc - Cross platform, lock-free memory allocator. Public Domain

Multimedia

FFMPEG - Complete, cross-platform solution to record, convert and stream audio and video. GNU LGPL2.1 or later or GNU GPL2.1 or later (some parts)
GStreamer - Framework for audio and visual media. GNU LGPL2.1
lodepng - Simple PNG image decoder and encoder, requiring no other dependencies. 3-clause BSD
libsoup - GNOME HTTP client/server library. Uses GObject. GNU LGPL2.1
libmpv - Music-playing library. Compile with ./waf configure --disable-cplayer --enable-libmpv-shared to not have the music player. GNU GPL2.1 or later
libsoundio - Library for cross-platform, real-time audio input and output. Has a range of back-ends. Expat

Networking and Internet

asnlc - Compiler of ASN.1 specifications into C source code. FreeBSD
czmq - High-level binding for ZeroMQ. MPL2.0
GNU adns - Advanced, easy-to-use, asynch-capable DNS client library and utilities. GNU GPL3 or later
GNU SASL - Implementation of the Simple Authentication and Security Layer and a few common SASL mechanism. GNU GPL3 or later
GnuTLS - Secure communication library, implementing SSL, TLS and DTLS. GNU LGPL2.1 or later
gumbo-parser - HTML5 parsing library in C99. Apache 2.0
http-parser - HTTP request/response parser. Expat
ldns - Library to simplify DNS programming. 3-clause BSD
libcurl - Client-side URL transfer library, supporting a wide range of formats. curl license
LibEtPan - Mail library providing an efficient network for IMAP, SMTP, POP and NNTP. 3-clause BSD
libev - Yet another event loop. FreeBSD
libuv - Cross-platform asynchronous I/O. Expat
libevent - Event loop replacement for network servers. 3-clause BSD
libgss - Generic Security Service. GNU GPL3 or later
libhttpd - Library to add basic web server capabilities to an application or embedded device. GNU GPL2
libidn - Implementation of the Stringprep, Punycode and IDNA specifications. GNU GPL3 or later
libmicrohttpd - Small C library that makes it easy to run an HTTP server as part of another application. GNU LGPL2.1 or later
libsagui - Sagui is a cross-platform C library which helps to develop web servers or frameworks. GNU LGPL3
libvldmail - Your friendly e-mail address validation library. WTFPLv2
lwan - Experimental, scalable, high-performance HTTP server. GNU GPL2.1
mongoose - Embedded web server for C. GNU GPL2.1
MQTT-C - Portable MQTT C client for embedded systems and PCs alike. MIT
nanomsg - C-based implementation of ZeroMQ. Expat
OpenSSL - Implementation of the SSL and TLS protocols, and also includes a cryptography library. Dual Licensed under the OpenSSL License and the SSLeay License
oSip - SIP implementation in C without additional dependencies. GNU LGPLv2.1 or later
pig - Linux packet crafting tool. GPL2
s2n - C99 implementation of the TLS/SSL protocols, designed to be simple, fast and with security as a priority. Apache 2.0
socket99 - C99 wrapper for the BSD sockets API. ISC
Tox - Communication platform, designed to be a Skype-killer. GNU GPL3
twitc - Mini C library for interacting with the Twitter OAuth API. Expat
librg - Library for building simple and elegant cross-platform mmo client-server solutions. Apache 2.0
dyad - Asynchronous networking library. MIT
h2o - Optimized HTTP/1, HTTP/2 high performance server/library. MIT

Web Frameworks

balde - Microframework for C based on GLib. GNU LGPLv2.1
onion - C library to create simple HTTP servers and Web Applications. Apache 2.0
kore - Easy to use, scalable and secure web application framework for writing web APIs in C.
klone - KLone is a fully-featured, multiplatform, web application development framework.
duda - Duda I/O is an event-driven and high performant web services framework written in C. Apache 2.0

Numerical

apophenia - Library for statistical and scientific computing. GNU GPL2.1
ATLAS - Automatically Tuned Linear Algebra Software. 3-clause BSD
BLAS - Basic Linear Algebra Subprograms; a set of routines that provide vector and matrix operations. BLAS license
CDFLIB - Library with routines to evaluate cumulative density functions fo a variety of standard probability distributions. Also can compute one parameter of the CDF given the others. (No license given)
cmathl - Pure-C Math library with a great variety of mathematical functions and CMake build support. Seeks to be close to C89/C90 compliant for portability. MIT
Cuba - Library for multidimensional numerical integration. GNU LGPLv3
FFTW - The Fastest Fourier Transform in the West; a highly-optimized fast Fourier transform routine. GNU GPL2.1 or later
FLINT - Fast Library for Number Theory; a library supporting arithmetic with numbers, polynomials, power series and matrices, among others. GNU GPL2.1 or later
GLPK - GNU Linear Programming Kit; a package designed for solving large-scale linear programming, mixed integer programming and other related problems. GNU GPL3 or later
GMP - GNU Multple Precision Arithmetic Library; a library for arbitrary-precision arithmetic. GNU GPL2.1 and GNU LGPLv3
GNU MPC - Library for complex number arithmetic. GNU LGPL3 or later
GNU MPFR - Library for arbitrary-precision floating-point arithmetic. GNU LGPL3 or later or GNU LGPL2.1 or later (until version 2.4.x)
GNU MPRIA - Portable mathematics library for multi-precision rational interval arithmetic. GNU GPL3 or later
GSL - The GNU Scientific Library; a sophisticated numerical library. GNU GPL3
igraph - Library for creating and manipulating large graphs. GNU GPL2
KISS FFT - Very simple fast Fourier transform library. 3-clause BSD
LAPACKE - C interface to LAPACK. 3-clause BSD
PARI/GP - Computer algebra system for number theory; includes a compiler to C. GNU GPL2.1 or later
PETSc - Suite of data structures and routines for scalable parallel solution of scientific applications modelled by partial differential equations. FreeBSD
PROB - Library that handles various discrete and continuous probability density functions. GNU LGPL3
Yeppp! - Very fast, SIMD-optimized mathematical library. 3-clause BSD

Parallel Programming

cchan - Small library for channel constructs for inter-thread communication. Public Domain
ck - Concurrency primitives, safe memory reclamation mechanisms and non-blocking data structures. FreeBSD
mill - Go-style concurrency in C. X11
libdill - Structured concurrency in C. X11
MPICH - Another implementation of MPI. MPICH licence
OpenMP - Set of C pragmas designed to allow for easy parallelization of code. 3-clause BSD
OpenMPI - Message passing interface implementation. 3-clause BSD
pth - Portable implementation for non-preemptive priority-based scheduling for multiple threads of execution. GNU GPL3 or later
pthreads - The POSIX thread library.
SLEPc - Software library for the solution of large, sparse eigenvalue problems on parallel computers. GNU LGPL3
TinyCThread - Portable, small implementation of the C11 threads API. zlib

Parsers

hammer - Parser combinators for binary formats. GNU GPL2.1
iniparser - Parser for .ini files. Expat
libconfini - Yet another INI parser. GNU GPL3 or later
libYAML - YAML 1.1 parser and emitter. Expat
mpc - Parser combinator library. FreeBSD
libucl - Universal configuration library parser. FreeBSD

Regex

"Some people, when confronted with a problem, think 'I know, I'll use regular expressions'. Now they have two problems." - Jamie Zawinski.

PCRE - Implementation of regexes identical to that of Perl 5. 3-clause BSD
regexp4 - Simple and complete implementation of regular expressions with its own sintax. GNU GPL3 or later
SLRE - Super Light Regular Expression library; a very small implementation of a subset of Perl regex syntax. GNU GPL2.1
sregex - Non-backtracking NFA/DFA-based Perl-compatible regex engine library. 3-clause BSD
TRE - POSIX-compliant, feature-full regex library. FreeBSD

Serialization

binn - Binary serialization format meant to be compact, fast and easy-to-use. Apache 2.0
c-capnproto - Implementation of the Cap'n Proto serialization protocol. Expat
cmp - Implementation of the MessagePack serialization protocol. Expat
libavro - C implementation of the Avro data serialization system. Apache 2.0
mpack - Another implementation of the MessagePack serialization protocol. Expat
netstring-c - Netstring encoder and decoder. Public Domain
protobuf-c - Implementation of Google Protocol Buffer in C. FreeBSD
xdr - External Data Representation; a standard for data serialization.

Check also: JSON, XML

Source Code Collections

This contains collections of small source code. If you want something big and integrated, check the Frameworks section.

CCAN - Modelled after Perl's CPAN, this is a big collection of C code that does stuff. The full list is here.
clib - Something of a package manager for C. Comes with a bunch of libraries of its own. Expat
gnulib - Collection of common GNU code.
libdjb - Collection of libraries doing various things. (Apparently) Public Domain

Standard Libraries

This contains standard C libraries.

Bionic - Google's C standard library, developed for Android. 3-clause BSD
dietlibc - C standard library designed for the smallest possible binaries. GNU GPL2.1
glibc - The GNU C Library; an implementation of the C standard library. GNU LGPL2.1
musl - Standard C library, compatible with POSIX 2008 and C11. Designed for static linking. Expat

String Manipulation

bstrlib - The Better String Library. 3-clause BSD and GNU GPL2.1
ICU - International Components for Unicode; a library for Unicode support. ICU license
libunistring - Library for manipulating Unicode strings in C. GNU LGPL3
libgiconv - Text conversion library. GNU LGPL2.1 (library) or GNU GPL3 (*iconv* program)
SDS - Simple Dynamic Strings; a library for handling C strings in a simpler way, but one that is compatible with normal C string functions. Available via clib. FreeBSD
shoco - Compressor for small text strings. Expat
smaz - Efficient string compression library. 3-clause BSD
utf8.h - Single header utf8 string functions. Unlicense
utf8proc - Small, clean library for processing UTF-8 Unicode data. License

Testing

CHEAT - Very simple unit testing framework. FreeBSD
Check - Unit testing framework for C. GNU LGPL2.1
CMock - Mock/stub generator for C. Expat
cmocka - Unit testing framework with support for mock objects. Apache 2.0
Criterion - KISS, non-intrusive C test framework. Expat
CUnit - Another unit testing framework for C. GNU LGPL2.0
Cutest - Library for unit testing with memory leak detection (Linux, freeBSD and Windows). GPL2
minunit - Minimal unit testing framework for C. Expat
munit - Small but full-featured unit testing framework for C with no dependencies. MIT
Unity - Simple unit testing framework for C. Expat

Text Editor Extensions

While practically any decent programmer's text editor supports C, there are some extensions that make it more pleasant. This is categorized by editor.

Atom

linter-clang - Lint C code in Atom, using Clang. MIT
linter-gcc - Lint C code in Atom, using GCC. MIT

Emacs

CEDET - Collection of Emacs Development Environment Tools; designed to provide IDE-like features to Emacs. Built-in. GNU GPL3 or later
Flycheck - Modern syntax checking. For C, it can use either GCC or Clang as a back-end. GNU GPL3 or later
Yasnippet - Template system, with C templates for common code snippets. GNU GPL3 or later

Vim

Syntastic - Syntax checking and linting. Do What The Fuck You Want To license
YouCompleteMe - Code completion engine for Vim. GNU GPL3

Tools

This is a list of useful programs to help you write and debug C code which are not editors, libraries or compilers.

Artistic Style - Fast and small automatic source code formatter that supports C. GNU LGPL3
address-sanitizer - Fast memory error detector. Apache 2.0
biicode - Modern dependency manager for C. Expat
c - Compile and execute C "scripts" in one go on the command line. Also has shebang support. Expat
c99sh - Run C files using hash-bang. FreeBSD
CBMC - C Bounded Model Checker; a tool for verification of array bounds, pointer safety and user-specified assertions. Original BSD
cdecl - Online service to translate C declarations into English and vice versa. Public Domain
cinclude2dot - Graphs include dependencies in a C project using Graphviz. Any GNU GPL version (due to underspecification in the file)
Complexity - Tool for measuring the complexity of C source code. GNU GPL3 or later
CScout - Source code analyzer and refactoring browser for collections of C programs. GNU GPL3
DDD - Graphical front-end for a range of command-line debuggers. GNU GPL3 or later
GDB - The GNU Project debugger; a debugger for C. GNU GPL3 or later
Glade - RAD tool to enable quick development of GTK+ GUIs. GNU GPL2.1
GMSL - GNU Make Standard Library; a collection of additional functionality for GNU Make. 3-clause BSD
GNU Global - Source code tagging tool which works with C. GNU GPL3
gprof - Performance analysis tool. Part of GNU binutils. GNU GPL3 or later
Highlight - Converts source code to formatted text with nice highlighting. GNU GPL3
include-what-you-use - Helps find unecessary inclusions and make suggestions for fixing them. Based on LLVM/Clang (and only works with it). NCSA
indent - Formats C source code automatically to make it easier to read. Also converts from one style of source to another. GNU GPLv3 or later
rr - Debugger that records non-deterministic executions to allow for deterministic debugging. FreeBSD
tup - Very fast, file-based, cross-platform build system. GNU GPL2.1
unifdef - Removes #ifdef and #if directives with their delimited text without touching any other part of the file. 3-clause BSD and FreeBSD
Valgrind - Range of dynamic analysis tools, including a leak checker. GNU GPL2.1

Utilities

This is a 'catch-all' category for anything that doesn't fit well anywhere else.

ApeTagLibs - C library for working with APEv2 tags. Expat
bfd - Library for manipulating binary object files. Part of GNU binutils. GNU GPL3 or later
cf4ocl - The C Framework for OpenCL; a cross-platform object-oriented framework for developing and benchmarking OpenCL projects. GNU LGPL3 (library) or GNU GPL3 (project code)
CommonMark - C implementation of the CommonMark spec. Various Licenses
CException - C implementation of exceptions. Expat
docopt.c - C implementation of a command-line option parser. Expat
dyncall - Another foreign function interface library. Expat
FANN - Fast Artifical Neural Network library; an implementation of neural networks. GNU GPL2.1
Firm - C library that provides a graph-based intermediate representation, optimizations and assembly code generation suitable for use in compilers. Comes with an example C front-end under the same license. GNU LGPLv2.1
Genann - Simple neural network library in C. Zlib
gjrand - Library of random-number generation routines. GNU GPL2.1 or GNU GPLv3
GNU FreeIPMI - In-band and out-of-band IPMI implementation. GNU GPL3
GNU gperf - Perfect hash function generator, given a list of strings. Outputs C code. GNU GPL3 or later
GNU Libffcall - Collection of libraries for building foreign function interfaces. GNU GPL3 or later
gperftools - Collection of utilities for measuring and improving performance. 3-clause BSD
huffandpuff - Minimal Huffman encoder and decoder. Public Domain
kdtree - Simple library for working with KD-trees. 3-clause BSD
Kitsune - Efficient, general-purpose framework for dynamic software updating. GNU LGPL3 or later
libavl - Library containing a range of self-balancing binary trees. GNU GPL3 or later
libbson - BSON utility library. Apache 2.0
libCello - Library introducing higher-level programming to C. 3-clause BSD
libffi - Portable foreign-function interface library. Expat
libgit2 - Pure C implementation of Git. GNU GPL2 only, with a linking exception
libimobiledevice - Cross-platform protocol library to communicate with iThings. GNU LGPLv2.1 or later (library) or GNU GPL2.1 or later (tools)
libnfc - Platform-independent Near-Field Communication library. GNU LGPL3
libPhenom - Deprecated, here for archival purposes. Eventing framework for building high-scalability and high-performance systems. Apache 2.0
ncurses - Coloured terminal UI library. GNU GPL3 or later
nope.c - C-language-based, ultra-light software platform for scalable server-side and networking applications (think node.js for C programmers). GNU GPL2.1
pbc - Protocol buffers library. Expat
rabbitmq-c - Client library for RabbitMQ. Expat
Ragel - DSL for state machines that compiles to C. GNU GPL2.1
Tinyexpr - Tiny recursive-descent parser, compiler and evaluation engine for simple mathematical expressions. zlib
uthash - Hash table implementation, allowing existing structures to be stored in a hash table easily. 1-clause BSD
cpu_features - A cross platform C99 library to get cpu features at runtime. Apache 2.0
pblog - Small, low overhead, structured logging library intended for logging formware events.Apache 2.0
libelf - ELF object file access library in C. GNU GPL2.1
mcpp - Portable C preprocessor. 2-clause BSD
libusb - Generic access to USB devices. LGPL2.1
alsa-lib - Userspace library to interact with ALSA. LGPL2.1
Capstone - Dissasembly/disassembler framework. BSD 3-clause

XML

"XML is crap. Really. There are no excuses. XML is nasty to parse for humans, and it's a disaster to parse even for computers. There's just no reason for that horrible crap to exist." - Linus Torvalds

Expat - Stream-oriented XML parser. Expat
libxml2 - Standards-compliant, portable XML parser. Expat
mini-xml - Small XML reading and writing library. No dependencies aside from C standard library. Apache 2.0 with exceptions

awesome-c

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Atom

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XML

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