Most recommended freeware C/C++ compiler?

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Big Red

Joined: 25 Feb 2005
Posts: 43

Big Red 13 Sep 2006, 15:49

Hey folks,

I quite simply need a C/C++ version of FASM, something that's freeware (preferably open-source), has basically no limitations in license, and compiles good clean fast efficient code. No GUI, command-line is fine. Doesn't need to support FASM explicitly (will be using DLLs for FASM functions). Only need support for the Windows line (98/ME/2K/XP), with MS conventions (are there any others?). Don't need any super-fancy features, just basic efficient C/C++.

That's basically it, if anybody has a suggestion for something that fits in a little with that description, 'd be great. The last one I used was the Digital Mars one, but that was a long time ago. Frankly, this is the only place I dare ask such a question, because only the ASM people seem to know what I mean by 'good clean fast efficent code'.

13 Sep 2006, 15:49

bogdanontanu

Joined: 07 Jan 2004
Posts: 403
Location: Sol. Earth. Europe. Romania. Bucuresti

bogdanontanu 13 Sep 2006, 16:05

gcc or PellesC ?
http://www.smorgasbordet.com/pellesc/

13 Sep 2006, 16:05

HyperVista

Joined: 18 Apr 2005
Posts: 691
Location: Virginia, USA

HyperVista 13 Sep 2006, 16:59

although i use vs 2005, i have used djgpp in the past. link here:
http://www.delorie.com/djgpp/

13 Sep 2006, 16:59

DataHunter2009

Joined: 10 Jun 2005
Posts: 144

DataHunter2009 13 Sep 2006, 20:50

GCC is the only compiler I've ever used.

13 Sep 2006, 20:50

f0dder

Joined: 19 Feb 2004
Posts: 3175
Location: Denmark

f0dder 13 Sep 2006, 22:19

Visual C++ 2003 toolkit had a pretty amazingly free license - from what I could gather, it would be just fine to develop commercial software with it, even software for non-MS platforms. Unfortunately, Microsoft pulled the download when they released the 2005 express editions (but you can still find vc2003 toolkit around).

I haven't looked at the 2005 express license, but if you don't mind downloading the whole huge package and manually extracting the tools, it's worth a look.

The MS C++ compiler (beginning with 2003 and even moreso with 2005) is one of the most standards-compliant compilers, and it beats the shit out of most other compilers in terms of code generation (with the exception on intel's, though last time I checked they weren't that different in speed).

13 Sep 2006, 22:19

DataHunter2009

Joined: 10 Jun 2005
Posts: 144

DataHunter2009 13 Sep 2006, 22:32

Quote:

The MS C++ compiler (beginning with 2003 and even moreso with 2005) is one of the most standards-compliant compilers

Well, at least Microsoft made one thing standards-compliant.

13 Sep 2006, 22:32

OzzY

Joined: 19 Sep 2003
Posts: 1029
Location: Everywhere

OzzY 14 Sep 2006, 01:30

For DOS:
* DJGPP (GCC port)
* Turbo C++ (old)

For Windows:
* MS VC++ 2003 (not available at MS site anymore.)
* MS VC++ 2005 Express

* Pelles C (best free light-weight C (not C++) IDE/compiler/linker)
* Lcc-win32 (C IDE/compiler/IDE)
* Mingw (GCC port) - C/C++. Can use Dev-C++ or CodeBlocks as IDE or use MSYS (unix emulation command prompt)
* Borland Turbo C++ (New windows version. Full, *big* IDE/compiler/linker)

Linux:
GCC

OFFTOPIC: Just using this thread to not create a new. Anyone knows a free light text editor (not IDE) for C with code completion and syntax hightlighting?

14 Sep 2006, 01:30

HyperVista

Joined: 18 Apr 2005
Posts: 691
Location: Virginia, USA

HyperVista 14 Sep 2006, 01:41

OzzY wrote:

Quote:

Anyone knows a free light text editor (not IDE) for C with code completion and syntax hightlighting?

@OzzY - Check-out Crimson Editor. While it doesn't have code completion, it does meet your other requirements, especially price Very Happy

http://www.crimsoneditor.com/

14 Sep 2006, 01:41

rugxulo

Joined: 09 Aug 2005
Posts: 2341
Location: Usono (aka, USA)

rugxulo 14 Sep 2006, 02:01

As far as C/C++ goes, GCC 4.x is 30% faster (but C++ object incompatible re: previous GCCs) with C++. DJGPP is currently at GCC 4.1.0 (POSIX, plus supports LFNs under Win32). MinGW is at GCC 3.4.2/3.4.5 (and almost certainly will create smaller .EXEs than DJGPP, even UPX'd).

OpenWatcom targets DOS, OS/2, Win16, Win32, and (beta) Linux. It's not quite as C++ compatible as GCC, though. But, it is open source too.

The following link will let you pick specific OpenWatcom files (instead of downloading a 60 MB installer):
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/devel/c/openwatcom/

Borland C/C++ Builder 5.5 is supposed to be okay (and can produce .EXEs which WDOS/X can stub), but I don't use it. I'm unsure about the new Turbo C++ for Win (supposedly a HUGE download).

This is a very hard question to answer. :-/

Ozzy, Vim, GNU Emacs, Jed, SciTE , or Fresh (Win) all have "dabbrev" (aka dynamic abbreviation). Syntax highlighting is much more common (almost any editor these days has it).

Last edited by rugxulo on 28 Dec 2006, 20:58; edited 2 times in total

14 Sep 2006, 02:01

Vasilev Vjacheslav

Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 392

Vasilev Vjacheslav 14 Sep 2006, 11:01

pellesc i think

14 Sep 2006, 11:01

rugxulo

Joined: 09 Aug 2005
Posts: 2341
Location: Usono (aka, USA)

rugxulo 16 Sep 2006, 17:27

TinyCC-Win32 (418k .ZIP, 1155k uncompressed) -- C only
TED Notepad (114k .ZIP, 335k uncomp'd) -- word completion via Ctrl+Space, but no syntax highlight

(Found the editor at http://www.tinyapps.org)

16 Sep 2006, 17:27

Big Red

Joined: 25 Feb 2005
Posts: 43

Big Red 16 Sep 2006, 17:34

Thanks for the suggestions, folks. So far the borland compiler (5.5) seems to be closest to what I'm looking for: one small package, compiles straight to binary, has basic C libraries, works with C++. Nothing more, nothing less (~). The gcc-for-Win32 stuff seems overly elaborate... what's with all the packages? geez. "Minimalist", they call it? Not too familiar with unix/linux systems, so will try djgpp, but probably not the rest. I need C++, so PellesC and any other C-only compiler is out. I have a copy of Visual Studio 2003 (full) I haven't used yet, so I'm hoping the toolkit's in there somewhere; I'll try that and the 2005 version, as long as it doesn't imply installing (2005-2003)^2005 Gb of complete nonsense which apparently it does. Why do they always drown the few MBs of programs I actually need like that? It's like we're hamsters and MS is burying the food just to watch us dig for it.

16 Sep 2006, 17:34

f0dder

Joined: 19 Feb 2004
Posts: 3175
Location: Denmark

f0dder 16 Sep 2006, 17:39

Just realize that borland has pretty bad code generation, and it's libc/c++ is a bit shabby. DJGPP (last time I checked) doesn't support win32 target, and it's runtimes has a lot of unix<>dos mapping weirdness, and there were issues with the programs on NT.

Extracting the necessary tools from visual studio isn't too bad, but it _is_ annoying having to install it, if you only want to grab the tools. Anyway, the "bin" folder of the "vc" folder of the install folder Razz

, along with "lib" and "include" - that's what you need. You can grab the "PlatformSDK" folder as well, or use a newer one if you like.

16 Sep 2006, 17:39

veach1

Joined: 16 Jul 2004
Posts: 165

veach1 18 Sep 2006, 10:56

Quote:

OFFTOPIC: Just using this thread to not create a new. Anyone knows a free light text editor (not IDE) for C with code completion and syntax hightlighting?

Try ASMED by www.avtlabs.ru.

Fully customisable text editor with custom highlightning and command line tools usage thru settings+*.bat files, unfortunately without C code completion.

I used it with masm, fasm, borland command line tools, c--, php-gtk, IMO the best light customisable editor.

Description:		Download
Filename:	asmed.rar
Filesize:	314.54 KB
Downloaded:	1104 Time(s)

_________________
dream of mind creates a monster

18 Sep 2006, 10:56

peter

Joined: 09 May 2006
Posts: 63

peter 18 Sep 2006, 11:51

rugxulo, Ctrl+Space is for selecting a word in TED Notepad, not for autocomplete.

OzzY, I saw many different text editors, but none of them has code completetion. IMHO, you need an IDE such as Pelles C.

18 Sep 2006, 11:51

rugxulo

Joined: 09 Aug 2005
Posts: 2341
Location: Usono (aka, USA)

rugxulo 18 Sep 2006, 17:57

HIDE 1.2.240
http://www.geocities.com/kahlinor/HIDE.html

Quote:

New:
Autocomplete added by Bernd Kastenholz.
Press ctrl-space to activate, word-list in Data\autocompletion.txt

Lightweight C++
http://students.ceid.upatras.gr/~sxanth/lwc/

Quote:

Lightweight C++ is a programming language that looks like C++ (a lightweight C++ dialect) and is directly translated to readable C by the lwc preprocessor. It's more "K&R" and, well, more lightweight. Important thing about lightweight C++ is that by studying the generated C code it is easy to understand how OOP features are implemented and what is the cost of everything. Adding new features and extensions is also very easy (much easier than adding new C++ extensions to gcc at least), and this is one of lwc goals: To keep evolving.

To compile the generated C you need gcc or another compiler with support for: C99 designators, compound statements in expressions and typeof.

RSXNTDJ
http://www.mathematik.uni-bielefeld.de/~rainer/

Quote:

Welcome to RSXNTDJ version 1.60, an environment for creating Win32 applications for Win9x and WinNT/2000 with the GNU C compiler. This product requires the DJGPP 2.x port to build Win32 programs.

The DJGPP port of the GNU C/C++ compiler can be used to create programs that can run under DOS. With RSXNTDJ you can also create Win32 programs. RSXNTDJ supports Win32 console, GUI, DLL‚s.

The Win32 headers in this archive are not complete. But RSXNTDJ contains the include-file WINGNUC.H to include the standard Win32 SDK header files from the Microsoft Platform SDK

RSXNTDJ also contains an Integrated Development Environment called RSXIDE. You can compile your source code without using a DOS box.

18 Sep 2006, 17:57

OzzY

Joined: 19 Sep 2003
Posts: 1029
Location: Everywhere

OzzY 23 Sep 2006, 17:02

rugxulo,
what's the advantage of using this RSXNTDJ with DJGPP over Mingw, for windows programming?

23 Sep 2006, 17:02

f0dder

Joined: 19 Feb 2004
Posts: 3175
Location: Denmark

f0dder 23 Sep 2006, 17:05

Probably that DJGPP has a more recent GCC version than MingW...

23 Sep 2006, 17:05

rugxulo

Joined: 09 Aug 2005
Posts: 2341
Location: Usono (aka, USA)

rugxulo 24 Sep 2006, 00:40

DJGPP's GCC is more recent, but newer GCCs are actually stricter and break some older code (e.g., GCC/DJGPP 4.1.0 can't compile GNU sed 4.1.5 but GCC/DJGPP 3.4.4 works with no problems).

I don't program for Windows, so I personally know nothing about RSXNTDJ, but RSXNTDJ programs can optionally be dual DOS/Win .EXEs, supposedly. MinGW supports fork() and stuff like that, AFAIK, unlike DJGPP. Also, MinGW programs use MSVCRT.DLL, as opposed to Cygwin (which uses its own POSIX compatibility DLL) and MinGW doesn't have the Cygwin license restrictions.

24 Sep 2006, 00:40

OzzY

Joined: 19 Sep 2003
Posts: 1029
Location: Everywhere

OzzY 24 Sep 2006, 23:11

I just came across 2 complete FREE cross-platform C++ development enviroments. They look like quite good for those who like RAD C++ programming.
I just don't understand what makes them not so popular.

Ultimate++ (for Windows/Linux)
http://upp.sourceforge.net/index.html

Looks great. Tried a bit and I'm quite impressed, but I didn't have time to explore much.

WideStudio (also available as RAD/GUI tool for C/C++, Java, Perl, Ruby, Python,Objective Caml...) (for Linux, Solaris, WIN32, FreeBSD, MacOSX, maybe others...)
http://www.widestudio.org/

Didn't tried it. But it looks like a very mature project.
It is in very active development, and it seems it's most used in Japan.

Just thought I could share it!
Have fun!

24 Sep 2006, 23:11

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