TCLite

I started reacquainting myself with C++ today. It has been years since I last compiled a program.

I was working on a text-based computer game at the time that followed the format of:

You walk into a room. You see a dog. Do you...
a) Pet the dog.
b) Kick the dog.
c) Talk to the dog.
d) Leave.

If you choose, say, "b" then you read:

The dog, unhappy that you kicked it, bites you and you die.

I learned very early on that the fastest way to end a line of code was to have you die. So in my games you did. Often. And very creatively.

However, on my last C++ compile I ran the program and was informed that I had missed a "}" somewhere in my code. I had thousands of lines of code and after three hours had yet to find it.

So I quit.

I moved on to Visual Basic at the time.

But I'm now getting questions from a kid about programing and it's time to brush up on my "mad skillz." So I pulled up a tutorial website and started browsing the code. But it looked totally different.

'Maybe I've been in the world of HTML and CSS too long,' I thought to myself. But then I came across a warning that TCLite has "nonstandard functions" and therefore is different from ANSI/ISO.

Who knew?

I certainly didn't, considering I'm still trying to figure out exactly what ANSI/ISO is compared to TCLite. But for the record: I was a TCLite boy.

Looks like this old dog is going to have to learn some new tricks.

~Luke Holzmann
Your Media Production Mentor