[c] How can I create C header files

I want to be able to create a collection of functions in a header file that I could #include in one of my C Programs.

1. Open your favorite text editor
2. Create a new file named whatever.h
3. Put your function prototypes in it

DONE.

Example whatever.h

#ifndef WHATEVER_H_INCLUDED
#define WHATEVER_H_INCLUDED
int f(int a);
#endif

Note: include guards (preprocessor commands) added thanks to luke. They avoid including the same header file twice in the same compilation. Another possibility (also mentioned on the comments) is to add #pragma once but it is not guaranteed to be supported on every compiler.

Example whatever.c

#include "whatever.h"

int f(int a) { return a + 1; }

And then you can include "whatever.h" into any other .c file, and link it with whatever.c's object file.

Like this:

sample.c

#include "whatever.h"

int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
    printf("%d\n", f(2)); /* prints 3 */
    return 0;
}

To compile it (if you use GCC):

$ gcc -c whatever.c -o whatever.o
$ gcc -c sample.c -o sample.o

To link the files to create an executable file:

$ gcc sample.o whatever.o -o sample

You can test sample:

$ ./sample
3
$

Header files can contain any valid C code, since they are injected into the compilation unit by the pre-processor prior to compilation.

If a header file contains a function, and is included by multiple .c files, each .c file will get a copy of that function and create a symbol for it. The linker will complain about the duplicate symbols.

It is technically possible to create static functions in a header file for inclusion in multiple .c files. Though this is generally not done because it breaks from the convention that code is found in .c files and declarations are found in .h files.

See the discussions in C/C++: Static function in header file, what does it mean? for more explanation.