Setting Up Your Personal Computer to Program!
Most students will have their own laptops, and will want to program on them. This guide exists to help you do that. There are three programming environments here, and you will have to choose the one that is right for you.
Note that all three of these programs are cross-platform and open-source. This means that they work on many operating systems (most importantly, Windows, Macintosh, and Linux), are free for you to download, use, and even modify.
BlueJ
BlueJ is a beginner’s environment. It hides many of the important details from you, but can help beginners get used to programming. If you are enrolled in CSCI 161, this is probably the program you are looking for.
- BlueJ’s web page is located here. You will need to choose the OS (Linux, Mac, or Windows) that you need. This is the user interface and programming environment you will use.
- You must also have the JDK (Java Development Kit) downloaded and installed. This will probably be done automatically, but you can use this link if not.
- Finally, BlueJ has several “extensions” which can help make
programming easier. These are located here. One of
these is the Main Program
Runner. If you download it and place it in your
extensions folder (inside the BlueJ folder), it will help tell you
when you have a working
main()method. (Which is important!). Be sure to close and re-open BlueJ, or it won’t work.
Emacs
Emacs is a powerful, text-based text editor. It can appear indimidating, but working with Emacs can help you to understand the inner workings of a Java program in ways that the other tools don’t. To use it, you edit your file from within Emacs, and then you compile using the javac command from the terminal.
- It will be useful to have a reference card with many common Emacs commands.
If you are using Linux:
- Use
synapticor another package manager to download and install theemacspackage. - Either download the Oracle JDK, or install the
openjdk-7-jdkpackage (or another version, if it is more recent).
For Windows:
- See the Emacs download page. You’ll find options for Windows under “Nonfree systems”.
- There is also an FAQ on Emacs in Windows.
- To compile in Java, you must have the JDK (Java Development Kit) downloaded. (If you already have BlueJ, it probably already is.)
- To start the command line, run the
commandprogram. To allowjavacto work from inside of any directory, you must add its home directory to the “path”. You can find instructions on that here.
And for Macintosh:
- Download Aquamacs, which is a variant version of Emacs that plays nicely with the Macintosh environment.
- Most Macs come with
javacandemacsalready part of the command-line environment. To open this up, just find theTerminalprogram on your computer, and run it.
Eclipse
Eclipse is a complete Integrated Development Environment a little like BlueJ. However, it is made for professional developers. If you have a job as a programmer, you will likely be using an environment similar to Eclipse. However, like BlueJ it hides several implementation details from you. It is recommended for the most advanced programmers, who already understand its inner workings, and don’t like Emacs.