How to Run C Program in Ubuntu

Ubuntu is a widely used Linux-based operating system for running Linux-based programs. We need the GCC compiler to compile a C program and run it on Ubuntu operating system. GCC Compiler is a component of the build-essential package that we must install from the Ubuntu repository.

We can install the build-essential package by using the following command in the Ubuntu terminal:

To learn more about GCC Compiler and build-essential package visit: How to Compile C Program in Linux?

After installing the build-essential package, we have to write our C program in an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) like Visual Studio Code, or a simple Text editor and then compile and run our C program on the terminal. We can use the following commands to compile and run our C Program.

1. Use the following command to compile the sample.c C program file in the same directory where the sample.c is present:

This command generates an executable file sample that we can run directly on the terminal using the below command.

2. To run the sample file, execute the following command in the same directory as where the sample executable file is present:

Let's see detailed steps to run a C program in Ubuntu.

Steps to Run a C Program in Ubuntu

Follow the given steps to run a C program on the Ubuntu operating system:

1. First, make sure that the GCC compiler is installed on your Ubuntu operating system, we can check the GCC compiler installation status using the following command :

If the GCC command is not found, install the build-essential package using the commands provided in the above section.

2. Use the touch command in the terminal to create a C program file.

3. Open the hello.c file in the text editor and write a C program as shown in the below image.

4. Compile the hello.c program file using gcc hello.c -o hello command in the terminal. It will generate a hello executable file in the same directory.

5. Run the hello executable file in the terminal using the ./hello command.

We can see the output Hello, World! of our hello.c program on the terminal screen.

Examples to Run C Program in Ubuntu

1. Let's compile and run a C Program to add two numbers in the Ubuntu operating system.

Output :

Explanation : We have created a sum.c file using the touch command and wrote a "sum of two numbers" C program in the text editor. Next, we ran the gcc sum.c -o sum command to compile the sum.c program and finally we ran the ./sum command to get the output on the terminal screen.

2. Let's compile and run a C Program to check if the input number is a prime number or not.

Output:

Explanation: We have created a prime.c file using the touch command and wrote a "check if the number is prime or not" C program in the text editor. Next, we ran the gcc prime.c -o prime command to compile the prime.c program and finally we ran the ./prime command to get the output on the terminal screen.

Learn More:

• To get a basic to advanced understanding of the C programming language, learn from the Scaler Topics curated C Programming Tutorial.
• Learn more about C Online Compiler in C programming language.

Conclusion

• Ubuntu is a widely used Linux-based operating system for running Linux-based programs.
• We need the GCC compiler to compile a C program and run it on Ubuntu.
• GCC Compiler is a component of the build-essential package that we must install from the Ubuntu repository.
• After installing the build-essential package, we just have to write our C program in a Text editor and then compile and run our C program in the terminal.