14. Other useful tools

In addition to using Calypsi to compile and link HP-41 MCODE and RPN programs, you will probably find some other tools useful. A text editor or IDE will be essential, while some other tools may not be essential, but they may make your life easier.

14.1. Editor

To write code you will also need a text editor and any decent text editor can be used. Another way is to use a customizable IDE. If you already have a favorite environment, just go ahead and use it.

I you do not have or are not happy with your current text editor/IDE environment, there are many to choose from.

You can go for old school powerful editors like Emacs or Vim. They may have a somewhat long learning curve, but you may find as many other have, that it is well worth it. If you are going to edit code and text, these tools are proven and designed for the purpose. They are keyboard oriented as they have their roots from before the mouse and graphical user interfaces become common. Fear not, by not having to lift your hand from the keyboard to reach the mouse, you will be able to work faster. You also have a huge set of very powerful editing commands at your fingertips. Aimed with these, you can edit fast.

If you want to go for a more IDE like experience, there are Eclipse and VS Code.

In fact, there are many editors on the market today, Atom, Sublime Text, just to name two. Consult your favorite search engine and surf ahead.

14.2. Build engine

IDEs and some editors allow building inside the tool. This makes the editing, build and fix loop very quick as you can do everything inside the same tool. This is very natural for IDEs, but powerful editors often provide it as well.

There are many build engines to choose from. One old trusted tool is make which takes a Makefile that describe the input files, the output files and provide rules for how put things together. Invoking make will result in running the minimal set of commands needed to bring the output up to date.

There are many alternatives today, like cmake and Ninja that can be worth looking at. Most IDEs provide some internal build engine and may allow external ones like make to be used from inside the IDE.

As an example, Emacs allows build inside the editor in a compile buffer. The easiest way is to create a simple Makefile with your project and then use the make command to build your project inside Emacs. A simple Makefile (suitable for GNU Make) can look as follows:

SRCS_16C = 16c.s mainframe.s
OBJS_16C = $(SRCS_16C:%.s=%.o)

all:    16c.mod

%.o: %.s
        asnut $<

16c.mod: $(OBJS_16C)
        lnnut $(OBJS_16C) Plugin4K.scm 16c.moddesc -o 16c.mod

14.3. Source code control

A source code control system is very useful to keep track of different revisions of your software. It is strongly recommended to use a source control system, as it will help you keep track of what you are doing over time. It gets even more useful if you collaborate with other people, or move your software between different computers.

If you are not using a source control system and feel it is too much hassle to set it up, take a look at tools like Git and Mercurial. Both Git and Mercurial are so easy to get started with and once you feel familiar with it, you will not hesitate to use it even for small projects. You do not need to set up any server and can move your project around on different computers and collaborate easily.

IDEs and powerful editors provide suitable functionality to work with tools like Git and Mercurial. You may find that you do perform some actions inside you IDE/Editor, but others outside on a command line.

The Emacs mode Magit is especially useful. It provides a lot of functionality and control using Git inside the editor and will make your life a lot easier, should you go that route.