Firstly, please forgive my ignorance regarding these matters, I have done a search and not found any comprehensive answers as of yet.
I plan on learning how to develop for Windows, however I am very fond of the GNU toolchain and don't really want to move onto using big environments like Visual Studio until I feel more comfortable with the underlying basics.
From what I understand, one can download the Windows SDK, which contains the headers and libraries needed to build native Windows applications.
Is the SDK literally just a collection of libraries and headers? If so, as my logic goes, it should be possible to point MinGW towards these libraries/headers, and simply build as normal.
When I build using Visual Studio, I can't see what preprocessor directives are being defined, what is being linked in etc. etc., as I am still learning, I like to be able to know exactly what is going on, preferably so I have to manually define, link etc. Hence the question.
So, what I want to know: is my logic correct?
Again, apologies if the question is rudimentary, I am still learning.
P.s. I am planning to develop Windows applications in a windows environment, this is not a question regarding cross-compilation.
Thanks!
MinGW is not compatible with the official Windows SDK, with one of the reasons
being that the SDK contains many VS-specific things (opposed to the GCC base
on MinGW). MinGW has adapted many of the necessary files, and for many programs
this is enough.
You don´t need to know the VS project settings for some program;
MinGW is still GCC in the core and used as such. If you can compile
programs with GCC on linux, learning how to use MinGW won´t be hard.
If you need functions/structures/etc. which are not yet part of it,
you´re out of luck, other than doing the adaption yourself, which
can be everything between very easy or very hard, depending on the case.
Additionally, proper thread usage is a bit quirky (has some "hidden" pitfalls,
which could go unnoticed in an actual program for years, but then...).
(While this is a disadvantage to VS, you´ll get C++11/14 (while VS hasn´t
even finished with 11, see link), better optimzation in many cases etc.)
If you´re choosing what exactly to download, look at WinGW-W64 instead of
the "original" old one. The original project somewhat stopped, has poor
lib support compared to W64, no 64bit compiler etc. (and don´t misunderstand
the "W64", it can be used for 32bit programs too)
Related
My task is to create a C++ SDK - in the form of a dynamic library(s), most likely.
It is supposed to be used on different platforms - Windows (32/64 bit), Linux (32/64 bit), Mac OS, Android and iOS. I don't have much experience with multi-platform project setup and I'm trying to decide what methods and tools to use for easiest development and deployment.
Side note: I will also have to prepare automatic builds (jobs) on Bamboo CI server, in order to run compilation and tests for each required target.
My main dilemmas are:
Project setup. Should I prepare different project schemas for use on different platforms (like .sln on Windows and makefiles on Linux), or maybe try using a tool like CMake? Is it even possible to prepare a CMake project that will suit all these target platforms?
Compilation toolchain. Should I use "native" C++ compilers for every platform (like MSVC on Windows and GCC on Linux), or maybe a single toolchain like Clang + LLVM? Would Clang + LLVM (and some linker obviously) be even able to build distributable binaries for all these platforms I need?
Development Environment. Which OS/IDE would be best for working on that kind of project? I prefer working on Windows and my usual IDE is Visual Studio - would it be viable in this case, or maybe something else would be more appropriate?
I know that my problem is very complex and there is no straight answer for any of these points, but every advice and even partial answer will be much appreciated :)
As you say, there is no one-size-fits all solution, so I will make some general suggestions. Feel free to pick-and-choose as you feel is most beneficial.
If you plan to do your building on the host OS, cmake sounds like exactly the tool for you. It self-describes as a "build system generator", where the steps to build on a specific host OS are abstracted away, meaning the same setup "should" work for any system cmake supports.
If you're thinking of cross-compiling, you're in for some hurt with the iOS and MacOS goals. As far as I know, and I have put some effort into trying, Apple does not release compilers for their systems that do not run on their systems -> You will have to compile for iOS and MacOS from a MacOS computer. If you can prove me wrong on this point, I would be glad to hear it :)
Depending on your licensing requirements, if you really want an overkill solution you could look into Qt* and qmake. I have had excellent luck with their multiarchitecture solutions, and Qt supports all of the systems you listed in your original question. I find Qt + qmake far easier to deal with than cmake.
* Yes, Qt does non-GUI work quite well too!
I touched on this in the second point of 1., but my general suggestion would be to use native toolchains. Excluding MacOS, it's easy to set up Virtual Machines, build server, etc. to build native code, and my experience with cross-compilers is they always add another layer of heartache, even worse than having to remote-access a separate builder computer.
Provided you avoid system-dependent headers, libraries, or extensions, it shouldn't matter what system you use. Things like <windows.h> and <linux/*.h> are obvious, but the best way cross-platform compatibility can be verified is by testing the foreign systems as often as possible.
Agnostic of compiler used, I would suggest turning on all the warnings. They are usually important, and may indicate a place where the compiler was able to band-aid over a problem but trying to compile for another system will blow up. If you're working on a team, it might be a good idea to set warnings to result in build errors to make sure the rest of the team is as rigorous as you are.
I don't know about LLVM or MSVC, but GCC will give you some hints as to platfom-specific extensions if you give it the -pedantic and -ansi flags. As explaind here, those flags tell GCC to warn for any GNU-specific extensions.
You are very likely going to need multiple tool-chains (you mention C++ and it has no ABI so to be usable on Windows you are more or less required to build with CL). It follows that you will not be able to use a single vendor-specific project setup. As the project grows maintaining multiple versions of project files becomes quickly untenable so your choice of build system is critical. Have a look at Shake and compare to alternatives with a similar feature-set. The choice of IDE is of less importance - many programmers prefer their favorite editor (Emacs or Vim) and may need to do work on any of the supported platforms.
I am used to Java and Eclipse, as that was what I first programmed with. That said, in Eclipse, when debugging Java, you can make code changes, and save them, while the code is running. The changes to the code will then take effect in the debug window, without a change to your code.
I am wondering if you can do the same thing, or similar with C++. I am currently using Code::Blocks, and I'm wondering if there is a debugging plugin for it that does the same thing, or similar. I know about Edit and Continue in VS, but I would really rather stick with Code::Blocks. Also, I have not programmed C++ in Eclipse yet, and will hot swapping C++ work in Eclipse? Or is that a Java feature?
What you're looking for is a feature of the entire toolchain, including the compiler, linker, loader, and debugger. Visual C++ has this feature because Microsoft has made all its tools work together to support it. Similarly, the same effort has been spent to make Java work this way.
As far as I know, Code::Blocks is just an editor but delegates the compiling and linking to other compilers (without specifically integrating with their features).
Java is JIT compiled (just in time, compiled at runtime) making this feature, perhaps not trivial, but not as significant a challenge as it is to implement in a C++ environment. I've been developing in Visual Studio for 10+ years now, and to be honest, I find edit and continue rather useless.
As to having it in Code::Blocks, gcc would have to support incremental compilation before this was put significantly on the agenda of many C::B users. There was a project to add this functionality, but I'd say at this stage, you're out of luck.
I am trying to figure out which C/C++ compiler to use. I found this list of C/C++ compilers at Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_compilers#C.2FC.2B.2B_compilers
I am fairly certain that I want to go with an open source compiler. I feel that if it is open source then it will be a more complete compiler since many programmer perspectives are used to make it better. Please tell me if you disagree.
I should mention that I plan on learning C/C++ mainly to program 2D/3D game applications that will be compatible with Windows, Linux, MAC and iPhone operating systems. I am currently using Windows Vista x64 OS.
First of all, IMHO as a beginner your development environment (IDE) matters a lot more than the compiler.
I think that people place too much emphasis on compiler choice early on. While it is not Java, C++ is meant to be portable.
If the program you're writing only works with specific compilers, you're probably doing the wrong thing or can work a little on making it more portable.
If you get to a point where compiler choice makes a significant performance impact for you, then you've already perfected everything else in your program and you're in a good state and you are also quite advanced in your abilities. We used to teach the differences between compilers at fairly advanced stages in the CS curriculum.
If you use a UNIX based machine (Linux, Mac, actual Linux), then pretty much GNU (g++) is the way to go and is fairly much standard. If it's good enough to compile your OS, it's probably good enough for you. On a mac you can use XCode as your IDE, and it interfaces well with g++. On Linux some people prefer command line tools, though you might like the Eclipse C++ support, it is much better today than it was 3-4 years ago.
Things on Windows are trickier. If you can afford it, have access to, or are eligible for one of the free editions (e.g., via a school), I think the Microsoft Visual C++ Environments (or whatever they are called now) are pretty good for learning and they are used in production. I think there's actually a lightweight visual studio now with an emphasis on C++ that could be a good start. If you don't, you can probably find a distribution of Eclipse that is specific for C++ and includes an implementation of the GNU compilers.
Use gcc and g++ while you're still learning these languages, a big enough task for now. If you need a specialized compiler down the road, you'll want to have much deeper understanding of the language and your problem domain to properly evaluate candidates.
I feel that if it is open source then it will be a more complete compiler since many programmer perspectives are used to make it better.
That's not necessarily true. You could also say that if you use Microsoft's compiler, it will be optimal for Windows, since Microsoft knows best how to optimize a compiler for Windows.
Microsoft has Visual C++ Express Edition which is free and ofcourse includes a nice IDE that's very well suited for Windows development.
But if you're interested in making portable software, look at GCC, which is the default compiler on Linux and which is also available on the Mac. (The iPhone works totally different and requires special tools that only run on Mac OS X). You can get GCC for Windows with Cygwin or MinGW.
Get the Visual Studio Express (easier and quicker IMO, to setup) and learn with it; when you think you know enough about C++ and how "things" work, you could start using something like QT or GCC (with cygwin) and learn to port to different platforms.
For windows u can use CodeBlocks I believe it uses gcc and its pretty user friendly
I strongly suggest going with MinGW.
It is:
Open-source
Available on all major platforms
Comes with standard Win32 headers and libraries
The key to writing portable C++ code is:
Use a cross-platform version control system (subversion is a great choice), because this makes it easier to
Compile and test your code on other platforms early and often
To quote the FAQ, 'No question is [...] too "newbie"'
What is the best way to set up an Windows system (vista, if that matters) to work with C++?
Preferably with a nice IDE, easy compiling of software (support for make files, etc.), but suitable for a beginner.
I would quite like the IDE to use a relatively portable format, such as makefiles and configure scripts, nothing too proprietary.
I would also like the ability to add new libraries etc. without much hassle, and work with the majority of C++ code others have written.
I am comfortable using the command line.
Thanks for the help, hopefully the question is clear. And apologies if it's already been answered, i did have a look for similar questions.
I know this is not exactly 'nothing to proprietary' but you should give a look at the free Express Edition of Visual C++. Under its covers you'll get all the familiar make and command line tools, but wrapped in a polished IDE.
If you're really comfortable with the command line then you can make an IDE from code editor on top of a compiler/debugger suite. MS's own command line tools come with the platform SDK (free) and you get an awesome debugger in Windbg. My personal favorite code editor is Code Insight. I wish so hard for a Mac version /sigh.
Microsoft's Visual Studio has a free express edition which contains pretty much everything you need to program c++.
For a Gui, the main choices are probably, MFC (old and ugly), CLR/.Net (new and confusing) or look at Qt(now LGPL) or wxWigets
There are quite a few good IDEs for C++ available on Windows.
The de-facto standard for professional software development is Microsoft's Visual Studio, which is available in different versions, like the free Express Editions. This will give you a great tool-chain for Windows development.
However, for a more "cross-platform" approach, you should have a look to the free Eclipse C++ Development Tooling, which is available for many platforms. As long as your own code is platform-independent, the whole project can be shared between Windows, Linux, Mac, etc.
Other alternatives are MinGW or CygWin that both allow to use the GCC toolchain on Windows.
Try the MinGW compiler, it will come with a C and C++ compiler, Make, etc--among many others. This can be used from the command line, pretty easily: g++ -o someprogram.exe somecode.cpp
As for an IDE, there are lots out there. Right now I am using Code::Blocks, and so far it's been really nice. As well, it already supports the GCC compiler, and sets many of the appropriate flags for you, so all you'll really need to do is hit the "build" button.
Some others you might want to try are Eclipse, which is really powerful, but lots of its "power" will be really confusing and difficult to use until you start getting used to it. Visual C++ is another one, which (obviously) would integrate very nicely into Windows. Of course, you could always use emacs :)
I suggest you evaluate CodeBlocks.
Microsoft's Visual Studio is powerful but rather proprietary. If you prefer open/portable stuff, I recommend Dev-C++ and Cygwin.
FWIW, I recently went through this and tried the VC++ Express and QT Creator based stuff. Coming from a linux/unix background I found that QT was a little better since it was using the Ming compilers and some make based constructs.
If you will only be hacking for windows I would go for Visual Studio. It will definitely save you time you can spend on coding instead. Most open source out there for windows either already have VC project, and if they don't it is usually very simple to set one up. And normally they have either make or nmake files for you to build VC compatible libararies to link with.
Currently I`m using Visual Studio for writing code in C++. But it seems so weighty that I decided to switch for another one, preferably free, not so strict to system resources (I mean memory, of course) as VS to learn libraries, such as Boost and Qt. What compiler do you suggest?
I'd suggest using Visual Studio's compiler from the command-line. You get the same high-quality compiler, without the resource-hogging IDE.
Although the IDE is pretty good too, and probably worth the resources it uses.
Code::blocks is exactly what you are after. You can can download it here: http://www.codeblocks.org/downloads/5
Choose the version with the mingw compiler bundled with it (Windows port of GCC). You can switch between that and the VC++ compiler as and when you like.
Code::Blocks has all the stuff you want, debugger integration, code completion, class browser, todo list etc. etc. It even import visual C++ projects.
Don't use Dev C++ which has already been recommended. It's very very old and outdated.
If you want to learn unix tools download and install cygwin It's a good set of tools but a full install takes up 5 or 6 gigs because so much is included.
There is always Digital Mars. Also, you can freely download Microsoft WDK
which comes with their C/C++ compiler and command-line build system.
You will be hard-pressed to find an IDE as capable as MS VS. It is incredibly feature-rich.
However, if you just want command line compiling and linking it can do that too.
GCC is also an option.
Please note that you do not need another compiler or IDE to use boost libraries. I wouldn't replace Visual Studio with any other IDE/compiler, at least not on Windows. Installing Cygwin or SUA (better than Cygwin, closer to the Windows Kernel) will only be a pain just for what you are trying to reach.
Try to minimize the memory usage by disabling unnecessary things, keep the amount of open source files small, use an alternative to document explorer to find help (your browser on msdn will do). Besides that, I wouldn't call a few ten megabytes of memory a high usage. As long as it doesn't slow your system down there is not a real issue.
A better idea would be to upgrade your computer rather than to replace something powerful with something that you don't know.
Seriously there is no real alternative to Ms's compiler on Windows. All the others are OK if you can't spring for Visual Studio or if you are just doing hobbyist work. Cygwin can be a pain to deal with.
If you don't want the IDE as someone else suggested just use the command-line compiler.
I've found VS to be quite good for doing Boost + Qt work. Especially if you have the Qt + VS integration tool. You get a GUI designer and respectable Qt project management tools.
If you are looking for a compiler that uses fewer system resources than the MS ones, you'll probably find that most modern compilers that are able to compile a good part of or almost everything in Boost will be quite heavy on system resources, both processor usage and memory consumption. To a certain extent that's just par for the course when it comes to C++.
That said, I do like to have a second compiler around if I'm writing portable code as it's a lot easier to iron out portability issues when you can ensure that the code compiles in different environments. If you want to do all that on Windows, may Cygwin is worth a look. However it does seem that the GCC you get with Cygwin is not exactly what you'd call up to date.
The aforementioned Digital Mars compilers are well worth a look, Walter Bright (the guy behind them) has been writing C++ compilers for a long time and they're pretty good. I have used them off and on since the early nineties and I've always been happy with them. Not to mention that they always seemed noticeably faster than the Microsoft offerings, but I haven't got any recent measurements to back that up.
At the end of the day, most third-party tool vendors on Windows tend to target the MS environment so if you're writing C++ code professionally and need/want tools like leak detectors, you pretty much need to be able to build with the MS compilers, even if they aren't your main development environment.
I sugget , Netbeans.org
NetBeans IDE , download the Cygwin , follow one tutorial from http://www.netbeans.org for C++ confuguration at Netbeans IDE , just 2 steps.. and u are ok
autocomplete (faster than VS')
classes
and all... you want xD
It needs to mention about DevCpp. It is a simple UI wrap for gcc compiler (oh my, it is sounds like a tautology). It provides lightweight IDE but not so stable (so, its IntelliSense is somewhat buggy).
If you use Qt why not use their IDE, QtCreator, there is compiler, debugger and GUI designer. All comes in one nice package and works on Windows, Mac and Linux.
In my opinion it's better than Code::Blocks (also based on MinGW/GCC).