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AristonCC · Sep 8, 2005, 04:10 PM

I am taking classes at the University of Phoenix and they need us to have a C compiler for one of the classes. They provide a licence for Miracle-C, but since I'm up on a Mac, I need to find an alternative C compiler. I have no clue of Objective C that comes with Mac OSX is the same as the C language used in Miracle-C so I'm a little lost in terms of what software to use.

Here's a link to Miracle-C so you can see what I need to find an alternative for:

http://www.c-compiler.com/

Thanks!

BLAZE_MkIV · Sep 8, 2005, 05:29 PM

developer tools CD has gcc.

larkost · Sep 8, 2005, 06:19 PM

Assuming that Miracle-C holds fairly close to the C standard, and that you are not going to be using any non-standard libraries (who knows?), then gcc (and XCode which wraps around it) will work fine for development. However, there are a few things to note:

Any compiler compiles for its environment (this is a generalizations, so please don't bring up cross-compilers), so if you are expected to hand in compiled executables, you will have to compile on Windows with that compiler before you hand it in.

If they go outside the standard C library, then you will not be able to work on platforms you can't find those libraries on. Of course I would then question the value of the class because it would tie you to learning a non-standard methodology.

Thinine · Sep 8, 2005, 09:01 PM

Why they use some third-party compiler instead of just telling everyone to use gcc is beyond me.

Tesseract · Sep 8, 2005, 11:49 PM

gcc is a second-class citizen on Windows (must install cygwin and/or mingw first, etc).
Though Dev-C++ is a good Windows IDE based on gcc and mingw, and it's free, I suppose that could have been used.

Anyway, the equivalent on OS X is Xcode which is either already installed (in /Developer) or it's on your Mac OS X installation media.

AristonCC · Sep 12, 2005, 11:30 AM

I'm hoping it will just be a matter of handing in the code itself and not necessarily the executable from the code. We'll see. I'll check it Xcode and hope that will do the trick.

Thanks!

AristonCC · Sep 13, 2005, 10:27 AM

Does anyone know if CodeWarrior for the Mac will compile C programs to EXEs that can be executed on a Windows box? Apparently University of Phoenix is pretty anal about requiring Microsoft. Instead of having to setup a Windows machine with a C compiler, I'd love to use a Mac based IDE that can compile to EXEs.

Kind of a strang request, but I just really don't want to do anything on a Windows machine.

Thanks,

samm · Sep 13, 2005, 03:21 PM

Compiling your code using CodeWarrior or Xcode to product a Windows executable is not possible to my knowledge. If the professor for this course does not let you turn in source code I would bring this up with the department chair, or ask yourself why you are taking such a course.

Chuckit · Sep 13, 2005, 03:24 PM

Originally Posted by AristonCC

Does anyone know if CodeWarrior for the Mac will compile C programs to EXEs that can be executed on a Windows box? Apparently University of Phoenix is pretty anal about requiring Microsoft. Instead of having to setup a Windows machine with a C compiler, I'd love to use a Mac based IDE that can compile to EXEs.

Kind of a strang request, but I just really don't want to do anything on a Windows machine.

It's not possible to cross-compile without quite a lot of trouble, as far as I know. But they should take your source code and compile it themselves. A programming class where you turn in EXEs is boneheaded.

AristonCC · Sep 13, 2005, 05:10 PM

My sentiments exactly. What I've resigned myself to doing is writing the code in Xcode and then compiling to make sure it works. I then copy and paste the code into an email to myself that I can check on my Windows box and compile there to hand in. Xcode is a much nicer interface than Miracle-C so I'm trying to do as much work as possible on my Mac before compiling in Windows.

Thanks for the help!