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Programming in C

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10 Chapter 2 Some Fundamentals<br />

the orig<strong>in</strong>al source program. In that case, the entire process of compil<strong>in</strong>g, l<strong>in</strong>k<strong>in</strong>g, and<br />

execut<strong>in</strong>g the program must be repeated until the desired results are obta<strong>in</strong>ed.<br />

Integrated Development Environments<br />

The <strong>in</strong>dividual steps <strong>in</strong>volved <strong>in</strong> develop<strong>in</strong>g C programs were outl<strong>in</strong>ed earlier, show<strong>in</strong>g<br />

typical commands that would be entered for each step.This process of edit<strong>in</strong>g, compil<strong>in</strong>g,<br />

runn<strong>in</strong>g, and debugg<strong>in</strong>g programs is often managed by a s<strong>in</strong>gle <strong>in</strong>tegrated application<br />

known as an Integrated Development Environment, or IDE for short. An IDE is a<br />

w<strong>in</strong>dows-based program that allows you to easily manage large software programs, edit<br />

files <strong>in</strong> w<strong>in</strong>dows, and compile, l<strong>in</strong>k, run, and debug your programs.<br />

On Mac OS X, CodeWarrior and Xcode are two IDEs that are used by many programmers.<br />

Under W<strong>in</strong>dows, Microsoft Visual Studio is a good example of a popular IDE.<br />

Kylix is a popular IDE for develop<strong>in</strong>g applications under L<strong>in</strong>ux. All the IDE applications<br />

greatly simplify the entire process <strong>in</strong>volved <strong>in</strong> program development so it is worth your<br />

while to learn how to use one. Most IDEs also support program development <strong>in</strong> several<br />

different programm<strong>in</strong>g languages <strong>in</strong> addition to C, such as C# and C++.<br />

For more <strong>in</strong>formation about IDEs, consult Appendix E,“Resources.”<br />

Language Interpreters<br />

Before leav<strong>in</strong>g this discussion of the compilation process, note that there is another<br />

method used for analyz<strong>in</strong>g and execut<strong>in</strong>g programs developed <strong>in</strong> a higher-level language.<br />

With this method, programs are not compiled but are <strong>in</strong>terpreted. An <strong>in</strong>terpreter analyzes<br />

and executes the statements of a program at the same time.This method usually allows<br />

programs to be more easily debugged. On the other hand, <strong>in</strong>terpreted languages are typically<br />

slower than their compiled counterparts because the program statements are not<br />

converted <strong>in</strong>to their lowest-level form <strong>in</strong> advance of their execution.<br />

BASIC and Java are two programm<strong>in</strong>g languages <strong>in</strong> which programs are often <strong>in</strong>terpreted<br />

and not compiled. Other examples <strong>in</strong>clude the Unix system’s shell and Python.<br />

Some vendors also offer <strong>in</strong>terpreters for the C programm<strong>in</strong>g language.

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