# Before you begin

Depending on how you obtained the Stand-alone Debugger, you might have also received a toolchain. However, if you downloaded the Stand-alone Debugger from the Eclipse web site, then you will require a toolchain before you can debug any projects.

The Stand-alone Debugger uses plug-ins from the CDT (C/C++ Development Tools) project pertaining to debugging an application. These CDT debugging components require some GNU toolchain elements such as the gdb debugger and gcc compiler. The Stand-alone Debugger does allow editing files but does not support rebuilding a project; a user can do that outside of the Stand-alone Debugger either either from the command line or using the full CDT IDE which supports edit/compile/build/debug.

Each platform that runs the Stand-alone Debugger requires different steps to acquire the GNU toolchain.

## Windows

For windows, MinGW and Cygwin are the two main platform choices for acquiring the GNU toolchain. It is important to understand the difference between them. Cygwin produces executables that use the Cygwin POSIX runtime. Note that this runtime is GPL licensed. MinGW produces native Windows executables that do not require a separate runtime.

- For MinGW, it is recommended to use the MinGW installer, mingw-get, to manage your MinGW installation. Download and run the latest mingw-get-inst package from the MinGW Downloads page.

  Note that the Wascana IDE has been discontinued.

- Cygwin can be installed from the Cygwin site at http://www.cygwin.com. You need to manually select the gdb and gcc packages. The gcc package is used to figure out default include paths and built-in macros for indexing the code for navigation purposes.

- The Windows SDK provides the Visual C++ compiler and header files and libraries required to create Windows applications.

  Note: For this release, the integration should be considered beta quality. It is not recommended for production use.

## Linux

All Linux distributions include the GNU toolchain. They may not, however, be installed by default. For instructions about installing the GNU toolchain for Linux, see the instructions for your particular distribution.

## Mac OS X

The Stand-alone Debugger supports the Apple GNU toolchain that is included in with the Xcode IDE. It can be downloaded from the Apple's developer site, http://developer.apple.com

## Other Platforms

The GNU toolchain is supported on all platforms that the Stand-alone Debugger supports. For instructions about installing the GNU toolchain on your platform, see your platform vendor.