Why Ch
Testimonials from Teachers and Students
Solutions for schools
Licensing information
Why C
  Why Ch? What makes Ch different from C/C++ compiler and IDE for learning?

C/C++ has a reputation for being difficult to learn for the beginners. Originated as a teaching and learning tool for non-computer science major students, Ch makes learning C/C++ as simple and easy as learning Basic. Whether you're a student, a teacher, or a professional, Ch makes the time you spend coding easier, more productive and more rewarding.

  • Quick & Easy to install and get started. The file size to install is less than 100Mb. No libraries to find and install, or wading through open-source websites. Ch lets your students begin at the beginning.

  • The interactive Ch shell keeps students interested and focused. The students can type commands or programs and see the results or errors immediately and interactively. Ch lets the students work more intuitively and turns them into active learners with a probing mind. No need to go through painful cycle of edit->make/compile->link->run->debug/break again and again. The instant gratification also helps make the teacher's presentations in class smoother and more natural.

  • ChIDE is an easy-to-use cross-platform IDE. Third-party tools such as MS Visual Studio and Mac OSX XCode only run on certain platforms. There is no way to show how to use different IDE in the class and students have to learn it themselves. There is nothing worse than struggling with an IDE that is more complicated than the language you are trying to teach. It is an overkill to create a workspace, then the project, make complex configuration, for just testing a few lines of C code and algorithm using big and complex IDE such as NetBeans/Eclipse for the beginners.

  • C/C++ Compiler are supported. The students have an option to learn compiler along with Ch if necessary. Visual Studio in windows and gcc in Unix are supported in both Ch shell and ChIDE by default. You can compile and run C/C++ code from either Ch shell or ChIDE.

  • Powerful features for helping teaching and learning.
    1. It includes the simplest tools for 2D/3D plotting and animation in C/C++. No need to mix your programs with Excel spreadsheets. No need to look for other tools with plotting capabilities.

    2. It supports advanced numerical capabilities and can be used to quickly solve complicated engineering and science problems. It supports computational arrays, linear algebra, differential equations, and much more.

    3. It supports shell programming and scripting. C-Compatible Ch shell is an ideal tool for learning shell programming in Windows and Unix.

  • It is affordable. The standard and student editions are free. Many third party toolkits and packages are free and open source. The academic lab license costs far less than comparable commercial products. Floating license server is supported for easy administration.

  Testimonials from Teachers and Students

"One of the main obstacles to learning a computer language is learning the things not germane to learning the language. Ch is as close to a perfect teaching environment as I have seen in 20 years for teaching C or C++. I advocate Ch to all of my CS students. If I were in charge of the world, I would require all schools to use an interactive environment such as Ch." --- Professor Gene Sheppard, Computer Science, Georgia Perimeter College

"Ch is very much appreciated by beginners and teachers alike. For the first time in my career, I was able to introduce pointers to complete beginners without it seeming unnatural." -- Professor Jym Feat, Paris8 University, France

"I used your products to learn more about C and C++. Out of the 15 products that I tried, yours proves to be the best and unbelievably easiest to use." -- Nick LaVeglia, a high school student

"I think that Ch is the best tool so far I have used. I used to fear C/C++ until I came across the Ch interpreter. Ch is good as far as its stated job is concerned. I like its documentation and its look. It helps me solve a lot of compile time and run time errors as I learn the C programming language. The only suggestion I can make is that it has to be publicized more and more on Google groups. I only wish that Ch would grow in popularity as PHP or any other scripting environments out there. " -- Ishe Chinyoka, a student

"I am studying Computer Science, and I do write a lot of C and C++ programs. The most of available IDE to write programs are very heavy, and simply do not follow the end user.

The most annoying problem of IDE's like MSVS, NetBeans or Eclipse are heavy, made user to make new project for every solution, and are putting lot of garbage to hard drive. Some solutions like notepad (notepad++, notepad2) + compiler are very cumbersome, and also contains some fancy, but never used options.

With ChIDE I have everything I do really need, nice, good working compiler, awesome notepad with tabs and indentation, plotting device (far better than gnuplot or other stuff). It provides the best IDE ever. C shell which is far beyond compare with csh. Also Unix commands on windows, that gives real power. " -- Visajo Capashen

More Testimonials from Teachers and Students

  Solutions for schools

  Licensing information

We offer affordable teaching lab licenses for middle schools, high schools, colleges and universities. Below is a list of available teaching lab licenses.

License Type
Description
Ch Professional Edition For teaching Introductory Computing, C/C++, and Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) courses
Ch Computing Bundle It includes Ch Professional Edition, and SoftIntegration Graphical Library (SIGL).
Ch Academic Bundle It includes Ch Professional Edition, SoftIntegration Graphical Library (SIGL), Ch Control Systems Toolkit and Ch Mechanism Toolkit.

To get price quote for a teaching lab license please send to info@softintegration.com your name, school, course name, syllabus (or your website), the estimated number of enrollment and the number of computers to install in a teaching lab for Ch Professional Edition, Ch Computing Bundle, or Ch Academic Bundle.

You must be an instructor or a faculty member in an accredited academic institution or K-12 school to be qualified for this offer.

  Why C/C++ as your first programming language? Why not other programming or scripting languages?

This is an interesting question. Ch is a C scripting language. We believe knowledge of computer programming in C/C++ is one of the most fundamental skills for today's students. You may find the answer from the links below.

The reason to learn C from a Ch User James Richards:

"I'm starting to use Ch for scripting and to learn C. I often have to write little scripts and learn more and more of Bash, GNU tools, and Linux to get done what I wasn't. I then thought I wish there was a shell in C, not like the other shells that are strangely called C shells, csh or tcsh, which are not like C. Even though learning C is much harder than Bash or some other scripting language, I realized learning C would have a lot of advantages. A lot, if not most, of open source and other software is written in C and understanding C would unlock all that. Also if I was careful I could write stuff cross platform that would work on Linux and Windows. Now whenever I have to script something I try to do it in C and/or Ch. Ch is a great product. I can do my scripting and learn C at the same time."