Step 4.5 (Optional): Install Cygwin and C/C++ Development Tools
Although originally developed to support Java program development, Netbeans is evolving into a general purpose programming environment which supports a number of languages. On this module it will be used for HTML, JavaScript and PHP. You will find it useful for developing Java programmes in your other courses, and we shall also show it being used to develop Ruby on Rails applications. It can also support C and C++ programming which on Linux is easy to set up. On windows, Netbeans requires the installation of a set of linux-like tools and the GNU C/C++ compiler tools. These are provided in a package called Cygwin. The screencast below takes you through the process of installing Cygqin, the C/C++ compiler tools and the Netbeans C/C++ plugin. These tools will not be required for this module, but you may find C/C++ support useful for EG-244 Software Engineering and the Unix-tools for windows provided by Cygwin useful for EG-253 Practical Internet Technology.
The screencast illustrates the following:
- Installation of the base Cygwin system (provides Bash shell on Windows)
- Installation of the Gnu C/C++ tools
- Installation of the Netbeans C/C++ plugins
- Verifying that the Netbeans recognizes the Cygwin compiler tools.
(Something goes a little wrong with the soundtrack in the middle of this screencast. Please excuse this glitch!)
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