Game of life in C

Question

Game of life is the simplest example of zero player game for cellular automata and it was proposed by mathematician John Conway. I have tried to re implement Nicolas P. Rougier's tutorial for python code with arrays for game of life in C.

#include<stdio.h>

#define clear() printf("\033[H\033[J")

void compute(int N[6][6],int Z[6][6])
{
//compute neighbours
    int i,j;
    for (i = 1; i < 5; i++)
    {
        for (j = 1; j < 5; j++)
        {
            N[i][j]=Z[i-1][j-1]+Z[i][j-1]+Z[i+1][j-1] \
                    + Z[i-1][j]            +Z[i+1][j]   \
                    + Z[i-1][j+1]+Z[i][j+1]+Z[i+1][j+1];
        }
    }

}

void show(int Z[6][6])
{
//show output
    int i,j;
    for (i = 0; i < 6; i++)
    {
        for (j = 0; j < 6; j++)
        {
            printf("%d ", Z[i][j]);
        }
        printf("\n");
    }

}


void iteration(int Z[6][6])
{
    int N[6][6]= {{0}};
    int i,j;
    compute(N,Z);

    for (i = 0; i < 6; i++)
    {
        for (j = 0; j < 6; j++)
        {
            if((Z[i][j] == 1)&&(N[i][j] < 2 || N[i][j] > 3))
            {
                Z[i][j] = 0;
            }
            else if((Z[i][j] == 0)&&(N[i][j] == 3))
            {
                Z[i][j] = 1;
            }
        }
    }

}


int main()
{

    /* 2D arraj declaration*/
    int Z[6][6]=
    {
        {0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0},
        {0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0},
        {0, 1, 0, 1, 0, 0},
        {0, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0},
        {0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0},
        {0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0},
    };
    int i;
    show(Z);
    printf("\n");
    for(i=0; i<20; i++)
    {
        //clear(); //clear screen
        iteration(Z);

    }
    show(Z);
    return 0;
}

Answer 1

#define clear() printf("\033[H\033[J")

Prefer making explicit functions instead of macros. They are more easily debuggable and compilers like to inline such short functions anyway.

---

        N[i][j]=Z[i-1][j-1]+Z[i][j-1]+Z[i+1][j-1] \
                + Z[i-1][j]            +Z[i+1][j]   \
                + Z[i-1][j+1]+Z[i][j+1]+Z[i+1][j+1];

No need for the \ when starting a new line in the middle of a expression. The semicolon is the delimiter of statements.