In this example, we implement the pre- and post-increment operators as functions to better understand their semantics. The code is in C++.

#include <cstdlib>
#include <iostream>

using namespace std;

int postIncrement(int & c)
{
    int x = c;
    c = c + 1;
    return x;
}

int preIncrement(int & c)
{
    c = c + 1;
    return c;
}

void print(int c, int b)
{
    cerr << "c=" << c << "b=" << b << endl;
}

int main()
{
    {
        int c = 1;
        int b = (c++) + 2;
        print(c, b);
        b = ++c + 2;
        print(c, b);
        b = -c++;
        print(c, b);
        b = -++c;
        print(c, b);
    }
    printf("\n");
    {
        int c = 1;
        int b = postIncrement(c) + 2;
        print(c, b);
        b = preIncrement(c) + 2;
        print(c, b);
        b = -postIncrement(c);
        print(c, b);
        b = -preIncrement(c);
        print(c, b);
    }
    return EXIT_SUCCESS;
}