[InterKnight]

Sorry everyone...I hope that all of my posts are not becoming a nuisance.

I want to get experience in many of the programming languages that are out there, including Web programming languages. My main problem is that the college I am going to does not offer a lot of the languages. And for those that they do offer, the classes are few and far between when it comes to scheduling because many of the students are too afraid of ruining their GPAs by taking them.

I know of sites where I can learn some of the programming languages, but I have just one question:

Are there any IDEs out there (preferably freeware) for Perl, Java, COBOL, and such?

I have tried Googling for this, but I have not found anything. I have found answers to a Java IDE, but I'm not sure which the best one for me to download is.

Once again, I apologize for my enormous amounts of posts (or so it seems to me).

Thanks for any help and guidance.

[Arcadion]

Have you tried GNU Emacs? http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/windows/ntemacs.html

It's the most popular IDE for UNIX/Linux systems and is also available for Windows.

[InterKnight]

Thanks. I'll take a look at that. It sounds like it's almost an all-in-one type of thing.

Thanks again.

[InterKnight]

Not having much luck downloading it...Browser says that the file cannot be found. I'll keep looking later on and then post an update.

[shdunnin]

Since you're developing on Windows, (I assume you will be using the computer spec'd out at the bottom of your posts), you could download the Cygwin environment from:

http://www.cygwin.com/mirrors.html

and use a more "Windows friendly" editor like Notepad++:

http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm

Of course the cygwin environment assumes you have some prior knowledge in navigating in a linux environment. Good luck!

Happy Coding,
shdunnin

[yto_daniel]

I know you mentioned preferably freeware, but ultra edit has a free trial you may want to look into. http://www.ultraedit.com/

Daniel - YourTechOnline.com technician
danielr@no_spam_yourtechonline.com (remove no_spam_)

[TofuTheGreat]

You specifically mentioned languages like COBOL.

I don't know if they still offer it or not but Fujitsu used to offer a full COBOL compiler to college students and hobbyists.

For COBOL compilers you can look at: http://www.thefreecountry.com/compilers/cobol.shtml

For Perl, Python, C/C++, etc. look to GNU tools. The Java compiler is available directly from Sun.

I remember seeing a site that listed free compilers for many languages. Unfortunately I don't recall the URL. A good place to look is SourceForge. Use the "search" feature and put in "compiler" and you'll get a listing. You'll have to wade through it but you'll find tons of stuff. Incidentally that site is great for learning different programming aspects!


Good Luck!


Christopher

[shdunnin]

Or you could just download cygwin which comes with java and c/c++ compilers as well as support for perl, python, and other scripting languages.

[TofuTheGreat]

Originally Posted by shdunnin

Or you could just download cygwin which comes with java and c/c++ compilers as well as support for perl, python, and other scripting languages.

cygwin does appear to be a great development tool. Just be aware that there is a learning curve there. If you have trouble finding compilers on your own then you may have trouble using a multi-tool like cygwin.

If you're comfortable with Unix or Linux and command-line compiling then by all means get cygwin! Otherwise check into language-specific IDEs.

[InterKnight]

Thanks for the help, everyone. You've made things a lot easier in this search. I've decided to go with Cygwin and just try to teach myself all necessary aspects of it. I have some experience with Linux, but I wish that I knew more. Unfortunately, I do not have a machine that I can dedicate to Linux. I only have one PC, and I am kind of skeptical of putting a Linux partition on the drive because I have heard that there are some complications.

Thanks again!