Dennis Ritchie, the creator of creator of the C programming language and co-developer of the Unix operating system has died at the age of 70 on 8 October leaving a strong legacy of digital creations.

Mr. Ritchie dies in his home over the weekend, according to a post on Google+ post from his colleague, Rob Pike. Bill Ritchie, his brother, said that he was in bad health in recent years following treatment for prostate cancer and heart disease. Mr. Ritchie, while working with Bell Labs made significant contributions to the field of computer science. He was the lead designer of the C programming language and was a co-developer of the Unix operating system along with his colleague, Ken Thompson.

The C programming is widely used in computing and other programmes like C++ and Java have been developed on the basis of the original concept involving words, numbers and punctuation. The Unix operating system is also noted as a significant creation in the field and its free and open-source version, Linux is used in several servers and computing systems around the world.

“Dennis was well loved by his colleagues at Bell Labs, and will be greatly missed. He was truly an inspiration to all of us, not just for his many accomplishments, but because of who he was as a friend, an inventor, and a humble and gracious man,” read the message from Bell Labs president, Jeong Kim, to employees.