Setting Up Your Development Environment

The minimum you need to write scripts is a text editor, such as notepad and a command prompt / shell window in which to compile. However, you will find it much easier to write and debug your scripts if you use a syntax highlighting text editor; compare the following two code fragments:

/* Event Handlers */
public plugin_init() {
  plugin_registerinfo("Player tracking Plugin","Counts player name changes",g_Version);
  plugin_registercmd("admin_namechanges","AdminNameChanges",ACCESS_ALL,
                     "admin_namechanges: Report how many times each player has changed their name");

  return PLUGIN_CONTINUE;
}

/* Event Handlers */
public plugin_init() {
  plugin_registerinfo("Player tracking Plugin","Counts player name changes",g_Version);
  plugin_registercmd("admin_namechanges","AdminNameChanges",ACCESS_ALL,
                     "admin_namechanges: Report how many times each player has changed their name");

  return PLUGIN_CONTINUE;
}

In most editors you can use their C syntax highlighting mode as the Small syntax is similar to C. If you are using Windows - I recommend using textpad which can be configured with Small specific syntax highlighting and can integrate the Small compiler. This guide shows you how. Under Linux, I recommend using xemacs. (Press Meta-X, then type "c-mode" in the command window to switch a .sma file into C syntax highlighting)

You can also make compiling must less arduous by modifying the compile.bat / compile.sh scripts to compile the plugins directly to your Admin Mod scripts folder Change the line :

..\compiler\sc -i..\include -e%1_error.txt -o..\mybinaries\%~n1.amx %1

..\compiler\sc -i..\include -e%1_error.txt -oC:\Games\Half-Life\cstrike\addons\adminmod\scripts\%~n1.amx %1