Summary
This chapter introduced you to GCC, the GNU compiler collection. After a brief tutorial, it covered many GCC features, including options for using libraries and header files, generating compile time warnings, adding debugging symbols to your programs, and optimization. In reality, it has only scratched the surface, though; GCC's own documentation runs to several hundred pages. Nevertheless, you know enough about GCC's features and capabilities to enable you to start using it in your own development projects. With this basic competency level, you are ready to start coding. First, though, the next chapter, "Project Management Using GNU make," adds another key tool to your developing Linux programming toolchest.