An IDE (Integrated Development Environment) is used to edit AND compile the code. Popular IDE's include Code::Blocks, Eclipse, and Visual Studio. These are all free, and they can be used to both edit and debug C code.Note: Web-based IDE's can work as well, but functionality is limited. We will use Code::Blocks in our tutorial, which we believe is a good place to start. You can find the latest version of Codeblocks at http://www.codeblocks.org/. Download the mingw-setup.exe file, which will install the text editor with a compiler.

A successor to the programming language B, C was originally developed at Bell Labs by Dennis Ritchie between 1972 and 1973 to construct utilities running on Unix. It was applied to re-implementing the kernel of the Unix operating system.[6] During the 1980s, C gradually gained popularity. It has become one of the most widely used programming languages,[7][8] with C compilers available for almost all modern computer architectures and operating systems. C has been standardized by ANSI since 1989 (ANSI C) and by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO).

C is an imperative procedural language supporting structured programming, lexical variable scope, and recursion, with a static type system. It was designed to be compiled to provide low-level access to memory and language constructs that map efficiently to machine instructions, all with minimal runtime support. Despite its low-level capabilities, the language was designed to encourage cross-platform programming. A standards-compliant C program written with portability in mind can be compiled for a wide variety of computer platforms and operating systems with few changes to its source code.[9]