Mail Archives: djgpp/1997/02/25/21:43:54
Daniel E. Connell wrote:
>
> Yes, while djgpp may be simple to use (once you configure
> it right/took me a couple of days), I also wish to have a
> more window approach to compiling. I have tried EMACS and
> RHIDE and still have yet to figure either one of them out.
I'd just like to add to Eli's excellent response by saying that if you
are really having any trouble using Emacs, just take a little bit of
time to get used to it. :) I started using it about six months ago (at
Eli's recommendation!), and had absolutely no idea what to do with it.
I looked through the help menus a bit, and found the tutorial. The
rest, as they say, is history. It also helped a great deal to get a
good '_emacs' initialization file, which set up lots of very handy
stuff. I'm even starting to learn a bit of Lisp! The latest Emacs
binary distribution should have a sample _emacs file that you can use
that will make things a lot easier. If you have any questions about
using Emacs, please send me email and I'll try to help you out.
As for RHIDE, it's a very simple environment. If you've ever used Turbo
Pascal or Turbo C, you'll get used to its interface in a snap; otherwise
it's not that different from any standard text editor, with a few extra
features thrown in. Just browse through the menus and learn what
function keys do what, and play around with the items in the Options
menu. Then type some code and try to compile it. Trust me - you'll
learn.
> And I'm starting a basic C++ course but they gave me 3
> basic files to compile to make sure I had a usable
> compiler. Well I finally figured I needed to use the "gxx"
> vice "gcc" command and DJGPP worked
That problem has bugged many a newbie, along with the requirement for
downloading the C++ programs as well as the C programs. I can't help
but wonder if there isn't a better way to say it, even though it's
mentioned in several places in the 'readme.1st' file and the FAQ.
Just as a thought experiment, I'd like to try to figure out the process
you went through when you first learned about DJGPP through to your
first successful compilation of a C++ program. It's possible that we
have things all wrong, and we should be explaining the C++ stuff in a
completely different place! Could you try to answer the following
questions?
Where did you first learn about DJGPP?
What made up your mind to try it?
What files/documentation did you read before downloading? What made
you look in these files?
What files/documentation did you read after downloading? What made
you look in these files?
What files/documentation did you look in for answers after your first
compilation failed? What made you look in these files?
When did you first hear about this newsgroup/mailing list?
I'm quite curious to see how a "typical" user learns this stuff.
Thanks! :)
> All the help files and FAQs are all separated and hard to
> find the info I needed.
It took me personally about two weeks to figure out how things in DJGPP
were organized and how to get help when it was important. I started out
by emailing DJ Delorie personally, and then discovered the mailing list
from his comments. I did read the entire 'readme.1st' first, of
course... but it turned out that I had gotten a REALLY old version of
DJGPP off of Genie's file libraries. Once I got the latest version (at
that time, 1.12m4), things went a lot more smoothly. The complete
evolution of my DJGPP knowledge would make a fascinating story. :)
> Of course I'm a newbie so I need someone to tell me
> specifically what to type for either one.
I guess I was lucky in that respect, because I didn't have to figure out
how to type things at first. :) The first program I tried compiling
with DJGPP was a MUD server, which came with its own makefile that
listed the commands needed to compile. From that, I figured out how to
use 'gcc' by looking up each option in the documentation. By the time I
needed to compile my own programs from scratch, I knew how it worked.
> Thats why I'm considering dishing out the money (I'm not
> rich so it'll hurt) for Visual C/C++ and maybe it will be
> a little easier to figure out.
You know, it's kind of ironic that you say this. The first compiler I
tried to use to compile the MUD server was not DJGPP, but a copy of
Borland C that I borrowed from a classmate. Of course, Borland didn't
have the slightest idea how to build a Unix-derived source, and I
couldn't make heads or tails of all those damned error messages! The
options were totally confusing and led me around in circles, and
attempts to look up functions and commands to see what they did were
fruitless. That was what prompted me to begin looking around for a
DOS-ported compiler. I must say I've been a lot happier since. :)
--
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