Thread: Hardware Manipulation with C++?

These are two seperate things: (1)Manipulating hardware and (2) Game programming.

(1) Accessing Hardware. This is OS specific, assuming you are using windows - based on your post - you would want to look at the Windows API. A good starting point is Forgers WinAPI Tutorial.

(2) Game Programming: In this case the best place to start would be looking through our Game Programming Links. The two popular choices for developing games are OpenGL and DirectX. Again take a look through the links to see what you would prefer to work with.

The simple answer: there is no simple answer.

The means of "manipulating hardware" are specific to each operating system (or family of operating systems). Modern operating systems are designed to prevent direct manipulation of hardware. If you want to manipulate hardware, you generally use some API (application programming interface) to request the operating system do what you want. Those APIs are fairly complex, because they can do lots of things.

There are some older operating systems that allow direct manipulation of hardware. Even on those, the techniques (API, etc) to manipulate hardware were often complex. But it was also found that too many programmers, if their software was allowed to directly manipulate hardware, would accidentally or deliberately find a way to mess up the host system. For example, writing over memory in use by other programs, corrupting a display, dropping bits of input inappropriately. It's still possible to mess things up via the API provided by a modern operating system, but is more difficult to screw things up completely.

If you want to learn to manipulate hardware via a modern operating system, you need to dig into the documentation for your operating system of choice, your development environment of choice, and any libraries (for example, graphics libraries) you choose to use. If you want to use an older operating system that provides unfettered access to hardware, keep in mind that relatively few users will want to use your programs.

Look up topics like game programming: they provide information on how to do things within bounds of the operating system.

> I'm currently using the Dev-C++ IDE which opens using the DOS window by default
First, that black rectangle with the C:\> prompt is NOT DOS. It is a win32 console.
There is none of the ancient 8.3 filename or 64KB segment nonsense.
Nor is there any direct access to the hardware, so you can't for example make a pointer to 0xB800 and expect to see things "on screen" if you start writing there.

Also, dev-c++ is an old (and unmaintained) IDE, with a similarly old version of gcc/mingw under the hood.

Here are some more up to date offerings.
Free Developer Tools - Visual Studio 2010 Express | Microsoft Visual Studio
smorgasbordet - Pelles C
Code::Blocks

@AndrewHunter: So, have I wasted my time in learning C++ if i wanted to get into games design then? :s Or is it worth learning the language alongside DirectX or whatever medium I was going to use?

@Salem: Thanks for the heads up Probably best to get all of the stupid mistakes like that out of the way before I get comfy with programming ^.^

And last but not least :P @Grumpy: Thanks, the whole topic of API's was a little bit vague even after I did all the research and you've really cleared it up for me

Originally Posted by GoldenNeo64

So, have I wasted my time in learning C++ if i wanted to get into games design then? :s Or is it worth learning the language alongside DirectX or whatever medium I was going to use?

As I said before, game programming and hardware access are two seperate things. DirectX isn't a language, it provides an interface for graphics, input, output, sound, ect. This is what you will be doing when making games, using a programmatic methods to interface with the hardware. You still need to learn a programming language to use this interface.

Originally Posted by GoldenNeo64

@AndrewHunter: So, have I wasted my time in learning C++ if i wanted to get into games design then? :s Or is it worth learning the language alongside DirectX or whatever medium I was going to use?

Last I heard, C++ was pretty much hands down the most popular language for writing games in. DirectX is a technology and not a language unto itself; to use the technology you would use the C++ DirectX API.

So you are on the right path, but be patient, because it is not a quick and easy one.

DirectX is actually an OS dependent API. It is made by microsoft and works on microsoft compatible platforms, e.g. XBOX360, windows, ect. You may want to stick with learning C++ and once you have the basics and linguo down then move on to graphical programming to include DirectX or OpenGL games.

EDIT: Also to get into game programming you are going to definitely want to get a newer compiler. If you decide to go the DirectX route, IMO the best compiler/IDE interface for that would be Visual Studio(see Salem's link) specifically for ease of installing and interfacing with the required libraries.