Beginner to Amiga coding.

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by idrougge

Thorham, I know you use an editor that can handle that for you.

It's probably possible to set it for that, but I can't be bothered. Also, doesn't E handle everything as 32bit integers?

[Samurai_Crow]

It has typeless storage for pointers in long variables, yes.

[Twiggy]

I guess it's worth adding that there isn't much in the way of tutorials/documentation for Blitz2 as there is for C.

[idrougge]

Yeah, that's absolutely true. You have a starting point here, at least: http://www.david-mcminn.co.uk/blitz-...chives/system/

[Daedalus]

There's quite a bit of Blitz material available on http://www.amigacoding.com as well, along with some reference material and links on other languages. But given that C is the closest suited to the Amiga API and is also one of the most popular languages on any platform, there will be far more in the way of reference materials and tutorials available than for Blitz.

[TroyWilkins]

Ok, it looks to me like C may be the way to go, thank you so much everyone! I've had a bit of a read and what I've found doesn't seem like it's beyond me, so I'll be installing SAS/C under WinUAE and trying that out - I'm keen, but not THAT keen as to run it on a floppy-only A600 (still waiting for the parts to arrive to give it a hard disk, also waiting for the 1MB upgrade I've ordered and paid for)...

http://amigacoder.x10.mx/tutorial/simple_window.html

This is where I'm starting from, as I had no trouble understanding lesson 1.

[TroyWilkins]

Ok, perhaps SAS/C 6.5x wasn't the best choice for someone new to C, does anyone have any good suggestions please?

[existentia]

I just installed VBCC, and it was a bit easier to get started with.

[TroyWilkins]

Originally Posted by existentia

I just installed VBCC, and it was a bit easier to get started with.

Ahh, cool, thank you, I'll give that a go, along with DICE...

[idrougge]

What's wrong with SAS/C? Did you use the package found here on EAB?

[TroyWilkins]

Originally Posted by idrougge

What's wrong with SAS/C? Did you use the package found here on EAB?

Yes, got the package from here, installed then updated, did all the updates other than the Y2K one... I'm a complete n00b and couldn't see how to compile a program. If anyone has a beginners guide or could give me a quick run down on how to use it, that would be very much appreciated, and yes, I know I'm being a complete and utter n00b, and probably very annoying, and I apologise for that.

[Daedalus]

Don't apologise, sometimes these things are tricky if you've never done anything like it before. Part of C's strength is also its weakness: its flexibility and modular approach means that there are many options that need to be taken into account, and these often mean the whole compilation process is carried out using command-line tools. A makefile can simplify this but for starting off that shouldn't be necessary, you should be just able to compile and go.

I've never used SAS/C (I tend to use Dice or GCC), but from memory the editor it comes with actually has a compile menu to run the compiler in the background so building your program should be as simple as saving the source file and choosing build or compile from the menu. If this doesn't work, perhaps there are some issues with the installation or preferences - there are most likely paths and/or assigns to be set and so on.

[TroyWilkins]

Thank you for understanding, I really appreciate it. I'm half expecting someone to scream RTFM at me any minute, and I had a look at the manual, but it looks like the sort of thing best read on physical paper, and I don't really want to print out all those pages if I can help it, I can't remember how many, but lots comes to mind.

Perhaps Dice or GCC may be more suitable for me? If anyone has the time and wouldn't mind giving a bit of a guide to whatever they use, that would be VERY much appreciated.

I just had a look and couldn't see any compile option in the editor.

[Daedalus]

Hmmm, that's not the editor I remember, but like I said, I don't use it so perhaps I'm thinking of some other compiler setup. Otherwise it's a matter of running the compiler from the command line.

Dice and GCC won't be any easier, they are generally run from the command line too so I would say stick with SAS/C since you have it set up and see what the documentation says about compiling using the Shell. For that program it should be a simple one-line command.

Edit: Here's what looks like a good guide: http://www.pjhutchison.org/tutorial/sas_c.html
It mentions Right-Amiga-B for building, which suggests there's another menu that needs to be activated in your editor, possibly by creating the project icons as described on that page.

[TroyWilkins]

Fair enough, I'm not locked into any particular option at this stage, and don't mind using the command line instead of that is better supported. I think I'll copy the documentation to my phone so I can read it anywhere and have it on a different screen. I've installed Dice 3.16 as well. So I'll also copy the documentation for that to my phone too and have a good read.

- offtopic - Back when Amigas could be purchased brand new and still have a warranty from Commodore, I doubt any of us would have dreamed in our lifetimes we'd carry around a device with a 5.7” screen showing 1440 x 2560 pixels, an octa-core CPU @ over 1.5GHz, 3GB of RAM, 32GB of storage... And yet, here I am wanting to write programs to run on a 7MHz 68000 on a 640x256 screen in 1 or 2MB of RAM, using preferably little space, and thinking of using the supercomputer in my pocket as a dumb text display unit...

[alkis]

SaS/C should be simple enough.

Go to SAS folder. Select "starter_project" folder. Copy. Rename the new folder to "hello".

Enter the "hello" folder. Double-click edit.
Write your hello world snippet.
Select from menu Project/Rename. type "hello.c".
Select from menu Project/Save & Close.

Double-click build.

You should have a "hello" icon. Double click on that. Enjoy!

[idrougge]

1. Just get the sasc658.lha archive, it's pre-patched and you just need to unarchive it and add some assigns.

2. Compiling a fairly simple program on SAS/C is just a matter of typing "SC file.c LINK" at the command line.

[bubbob42]

Or press f4 within the editor to compile and right-Amiga+b to build.

And yes, RTFM.

[TroyWilkins]

Ahhh... Thank you everyone. Now I realise where my confusion came from, I didn't realise that there were 2 steps involved, compiling and then building. I really appreciate everyones responses here to what must seem like stupid questions.

[TroyWilkins]

Success!