Programming with GNU Software: Tools from Cygnus Support

by Andy Oram, Mike Loukides

The promise of having control over their environment draws programmers to UNIX. It offers powerful tools for the initiated within an operating system that can be customized and tuned in almost unlimited ways. Programmers use UNIX because it lets them do what they want. And they like to see the source code for the software they work with.So it's no surprise the most popular programming tools on UNIX are free. They're easy to get, easy to customize, and better than many tools put out by vendors. They also offer a great deal of power. And the source code is publicly available.This book and CD combination is a complete package for programmers who are new to UNIX or who would like to make better use of the system. The tools come from Cygnus Support, Inc., and Cyclic Software, companies that provide support for free software. The tools on the CD The book provides an introduction to all these tools for a C programmer. Previous experience with UNIX is not required.The CD-ROM in this book contains binaries for several popular UNIX systems, including Sun SPARC4 running SunOS 4.1.3, Sun SPARC4 running Solaris 2.4, HP 9000/700 running HPUX, IBM RS/6000 running AIX 3, SGI Iris/Indigo running Irix 5.3, and Alpha running Digital UNIX. Complete source code and scripts for configuration, building, and installation are also included.

Genres: Programming, Reference, Computers, Technical, Nonfiction

260 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 1996

Reviews

[Elie De Brauwer · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book, dating from '97, is actually a beauty. It covers a summary of programming on a UNIX environment without any of the 'fancy' modern stuff. It focuses on getting started with the fundations being C, gcc, make, gdb, emacs and the commandline and focuses on the layer many people just skip nowadays. The book is actually written in a cross-platform mindset (think about the glory days of the DEC Alpha, SGI Irix, Sun Sparc, ...) but translates very well to a more modern embedded mindset and if you can make this click and can get rid of the nostalgia the book hasn't really aged a bit (okay, not true, there is still a chapter on rcs).

[Tech Nossomy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Before there were online forums (where both the questions and the answers are of varying quality) there were reference works, such as this book, to help out aspiring programmers. The text is well written, with almost no frivolity and the information presented with much clarity.

The year of publication (1997) did not see yet the advent of continuous integration and automated version control or even syntax highlighting, but still the book discusses many of the fundamentals that are still used today, such as the make utility, compiler diagnostics and debugging features. One also has to ignore the bits of self-promotion, otherwise a good book.