Getting into Software

If you’re a user of the Invisionfree forum software, you should find that I (Dr Code) am on the forums as a self-proclaimed technical support person. I’ll try to answer questions to the best of my ability if I can. Look for me in the coming weeks, as I’ll also be an unofficial technical support for other software’s. 🙂

Dr Code

First Day of C Programming

Yesterday was my first day ever of programming in C. And I must admit it was harder than I thought to get my C/C++ environment set up. First of all, I had to wait until I got the book on C Programming, which I had reserved from the library. It came in later than I thought, which meant more delay for me. Well, it finally arrived a couple of days ago, and that was when I was hit with about a thousand school assignments. Talk about bad timing. 😛

It took me an age to get those out of the way, but then it was the weekend. So, yesterday, I finally sat down and opened my book on C programming. Now, before I could actually start writing and executing C, I had to set up a compiler, make sure I had a terminal window available,(You can view the output of the C programme, via the terminal window in most circumstances),  plus a text editor.

Now, because that process is rather complicated, I decided to go with a package, that had the compiler, terminal window, and text editor, all in one. I checked to see which all in one package, the book recommended. Then, I downloaded Dev-C++ from Blood-Shed. Now you may notice that the name of the package is C++. It is still perfectly capable for C environments, you just need to set the programe so C is the default environment you’ll be working in.

Once I had chosen the recommended package, I waited over an hour while all eight megabites of the programme downloaded onto my computer. once that was completed, I followed my way through the installation steps, and finally completed the set up. Now, I thought my work was done, but it wasn’t – yet. As soon as the programme was up and running, I closed it down, and went to the folder where this package had its roots, and tried to start it up from there. Unfortunately, this was not successive, and each time I tried to start it from there, a message came up that told me I needed to install it, and it asked me if I wanted to. Now, if I hadn’t found another option to start it, without completely re-installing it, I may have continued wasting my time. So, after fooling around for a little while, I finally discovered another option to start it. When I clicked on it – yippeeee! – it came up, completely functional.

Now, I had just one last thing to do, before I could begin writing C. I had to set up it’s environment. When it came, its default was a C++ envitonment, which is not what I wanted. So, I changed the default settings to C. And, now I was ready to write (and hopefully execute), C programmes.

Well, I wrote my first script, and after debugging it to check for errors, I wanted to run the output of it in a terminal window. But when I tried opening the terminal, it flashed on and off very quickly. I read on in the book, and discovered that I needed to put a certain command in the programme so the terminal window flashes on, but doesn’t do anything without a keystroke. The output of my first programme written in C, was simply “Hello World”.

Stay tuned.

Dr Code

Welcome to Dr Code’s new blog about computers!

Greetings Friends!

First of all, I’d like to welcome you to my brand new blog – the second I’ve ever made. You might be thinking: “That guy is an absolute n00b, and he pretends to be a computer techie!” Well, actually, everyone has to start off somewhere… 😀

Anyway, this website will be sort of like a virtual journal about my career with computers and everything related to it. I hope you’ll enjoy taking this journey with me. And just so you know that currently, I am nowhere near to claiming the title: “Computer Techie”, but it is a goal I aim to achieve before long.

By the way, the other blog I made is still up and running, and in fact it is a virtual web journal on another of my all time favorite hobbies – writing. Currently I’m working on a huge series of fantasy books, and also planned short stories. You can read all about it and more at Fantasy Writer. And just to clarify, so I’m not piled with questions later, no I do not go by the name “Dr Code” on the writing blog. That name is reserved for all computer related things. 🙂

Please enjoy this site.

Dr Code