C Language Environment Setup

C Language Environment Setup

Before you start doing programming using C programming language, you need the following

Two software’s available on your computer. Text Editor and The C language Compiler. 

Text Editor

This will be used to type your program. Examples of few editors include Windows Notepad, OS Edit command, Brief, Epsilon, EMACS, and vim or vi.

Name and version of text editor can vary on different operating systems. For example, Notepad will be used on Windows, and vim or vi can be used on windows as well as Linux or UNIX.

The files you create with your editor are called source files and contain program source code. The source files for C language programs are typically named with the extension “.c”

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Before starting your programming, make sure you have one text editor in place and you have enough experience to write a computer program, save it in a file, compile it and finally execute it.

The C language Compiler

The source code written in source file is the human readable source for your program. It needs to be "compiled", to turn into machine language so that your CPU can actually execute the program as per instructions given.

This C programming language compiler will be used to compile your source code into final executable program. I assume you have basic knowledge about a programming language compiler.

Most frequently used and free available compiler is GNU C language/C++ compiler, otherwise you can have compilers either from HP or Solaris if you have respective Operating Systems.

Following section guides you on how to install GNU C language/C++ compiler on various OS. I'm mentioning C language/C++ together because GNU gcc compiler works for both C language and C++ programming languages.