Thread: Newbie needs help!

I'm new to programming, and I am using a Sams book to teach myself C++. The compiler that came with it is called Bloodshed. My problem is, I can't see any of my programs' output. I write the code and I click "compile and run" and a window comes up telling me that I have no errors. But no window ever comes up that shows the output, e.g. "Hello World!" or whatever it is the program is supposed to do. I don't even see a DOS window flicker or anything. I put a cin.get() line in, and even cut and pasted other people's posted code just to see if I could get it to work, and I get nothing. I find C++ really exciting, but I'm banging my head against a wall here. It's probably something really simple, so help me out, please.

Oh yeah, and I can't figure out how to make the program into a stand-alone .exe either.

If you have the project set to "console application" it should run, the default is a stand alone exe. Open a dos box, cd to the directory where your cpp file lives type "g++ filename.cpp -o filename" then, assuming no complaints, you should see filename.exe in the same directory. The default windows application project should also produce a pointless window. If you delete winmain, but keep main I have no idea what happens but that might do what you describe. Do you see copies of your programm just sitting there in task manager?