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Best C Program? by .Roy on 09-07-2006 at 12:02 PM
I just started Computers and we will be learning C and C++
Whats the best program/s for both?
For now i only need C.
RE: Best C Program? by Lourix on 09-07-2006 at 12:09 PM
Maybe Notepad+ ?
RE: Best C Program? by Stigmata on 09-07-2006 at 12:19 PM
you can get yourself a free copy of visual c++ or c# 2005 express for free from this site
http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/default.aspx
id recommend c#
but it would prob make sense for you to use c++ 
RE: Best C Program? by MeEtc on 09-07-2006 at 12:28 PM
RE: Best C Program? by segosa on 09-07-2006 at 02:10 PM
They should tell you what compiler they expect you to use.
It'll be a difficult year for the teacher if each person is using a different compiler.
RE: Best C Program? by absorbation on 09-07-2006 at 02:44 PM
You can be taught the basics of programming but in order to really learn you need to make your own projects and understand how to manage one. They may provide Visual Studio but I suggest Dev C++ as a complier
Why are they teaching C, surly C++ would be a better way to start.
RE: RE: Best C Program? by segosa on 09-07-2006 at 06:05 PM
quote:
Originally posted by absorbation
Why are they teaching C, surly C++ would be a better way to start.
Both languages have exactly the same syntax. It doesn't matter which you start with. Think of C++ as C with extra features.
RE: Best C Program? by John Anderton on 09-07-2006 at 06:14 PM
I like TurboC for basics and Microsoft Visual C++ (Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Express Edition is the latest one that i have) thereafter 
RE: Best C Program? by absorbation on 09-07-2006 at 07:42 PM
quote:
Originally posted by segosa
Both languages have exactly the same syntax. It doesn't matter which you start with. Think of C++ as C with extra features.
Ya, my point exactly. Why teach C when you can teach a better language with more functions that is now used more today. It does have some changes, mainly to the basic structure of the code, but they say learning C++ is easier without knowing C. I found C++ a really easy language, mainly because it is so similar to PHP which is basically a web based version of C ++
RE: Best C Program? by RaceProUK on 09-07-2006 at 08:40 PM
quote:Bollocks. Once you've learnt C, you're already halfway to learning C++.
Originally posted by absorbation
but they say learning C++ is easier without knowing C
quote:
Originally posted by absorbation
Why teach C when you can teach a better language with more functions that is now used more today
quote:Linux article.
Originally posted by Wikipedia
The majority of the code (71%) was written in the C programming language, but many other languages were used, including C++, Lisp, assembly language, Perl, Fortran, Python and various shell scriptinglanguages. Slightly over half of all lines of code were licensed underthe GPL. The Linux kernel was 2.4 million lines of code, or 8% of thetotal.
Also, Windows is written, in part, in C. There are plenty of C files in the leaked Win2000 code at least.
RE: Best C Program? by Adeptus on 09-07-2006 at 09:29 PM
quote:Any programming course for persons without prior programming experience (which, I assume, is what this is) will spend a lot of time dealing with general programming concepts -- different types of variables, what are functions and how to use them, loops and conditional statements, and so forth. It so happens these are the things that overlap between C and C++.
Originally posted by absorbation
Why teach C when you can teach a better language with more functions that is now used more today.
Where there are differences on that level, C++ ways are often more confusing to a novice.
For example, a C++ course would be obligated to use streams (cout << "Hello world!") instead of stdio.h (printf("Hello world!"). Realize that the student is likely to see the above long before they've been told anything about operator overloading. I'd hate to be the instructor having to explain how the C++ way works at that point, should an observant student inquire why we are using the bitwise left shift operator in a funny way.
RE: Best C Program? by lizard.boy on 09-07-2006 at 10:04 PM
Hell, we learn VB6 in my school. (grade 10/11 for sure) I'm sure its partly because of the budget and not being able to afford newer versions, but really, they dont need to. VB is great for teaching people programming concepts, and once you get the main concepts you can take your knoledge to another language. The ideas are basically the same, the sytnax is different.
RE: RE: Best C Program? by andrewdodd13 on 09-08-2006 at 06:48 AM
quote:
Originally posted by absorbation
quote:
Originally posted by segosa
Both languages have exactly the same syntax. It doesn't matter which you start with. Think of C++ as C with extra features.
Ya, my point exactly. Why teach C when you can teach a better language with more functions that is now used more today. It does have some changes, mainly to the basic structure of the code, but they say learning C++ is easier without knowing C. I found C++ a really easy language, mainly because it is so similar to PHP which is basically a web based version of C ++
Simply put, "C++ applications are generally slower at runtime, and are much slower to compile than C programs. The low-level infrastructure for C++ binary execution is also larger. For these reasons C is always commonly used even if C++ has alot of popularity, and will probably continue to be used in projects where size and speed are primary concerns, and portable code still required (assembly would be unsuitable then)."
RE: RE: Best C Program? by segosa on 09-08-2006 at 07:46 AM
quote:
Originally posted by lizard.boy
Hell, we learn VB6 in my school. (grade 10/11 for sure) I'm sure its partly because of the budget and not being able to afford newer versions, but really, they dont need to. VB is great for teaching people programming concepts, and once you get the main concepts you can take your knoledge to another language. The ideas are basically the same, the sytnax is different.
Have you learnt VB and then tried to learn a more low-level language like C++? I have. It's hell. VB totally distorts all your ideas of how programming should be and makes it very difficult to understand the small intricacies of C or C++. A good example being pointers.
RE: Best C Program? by absorbation on 09-08-2006 at 03:05 PM
quote:
Originally posted by segosa
Have you learnt VB and then tried to learn a more low-level language like C++? I have. It's hell. VB totally distorts all your ideas of how programming should be and makes it very difficult to understand the small intricacies of C or C++. A good example being pointers.
True, I have tried to learn VB, but Visual Studio seemed bloated and because I know PHP the syntax or C++ came to me easier and I understood how it worked pretty quickly.
When I say C++ is better than C, I mean why are schools teachings older more outdated languages when they can teach newer ways to code software. Of course C had some advantages over C++. C++ was last revised in 2003 and hopefully should reflect changes in modern software
RE: Best C Program? by RaceProUK on 09-08-2006 at 03:34 PM
quote:Again, I must draw attention to the fact that the two most well-known operating systems (Windows and Linux) are written more in C than any other language. The same should apply to the BSDs, which grew from Unix, which was written in C. Far from being 'outdated', C is thriving. It's even nicked a few features from C++ along the way.
Originally posted by absorbation
I mean why are schools teachings older more outdated languages when they can teach newer ways to code software
I know C was last updated in the 80s, but it just goes to show how well-designed a language it is, to have required no updates in two decades.
As a language to teach high-level concepts, C doesn't cut it, I admit. But that's why there's languages such as C++, C# and Java, which have a C-like syntax. For teaching low-level though, thsese high-level languages don't cut it. C does.
At the end of the day, for high-speed programs and low-level tasks, only assembly code is practically better than C. And assembly code is a real bitch compared to C.