🧩 Clings — Interactive C Learning Exercises

Clings is a lightweight, interactive playground for learning C programming.
It provides small, testable exercises and an interactive Bash-based environment — similar to Rustlings, but for C.

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🧠 Overview

Clings is designed to make learning C more engaging and practical.
Each exercise focuses on a specific programming concept, and you can check, reset, or get hints interactively.

💡 Think of it as your terminal-based C tutor!

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📦 Project Structure

CLINGS/
├── exercises/          # C source files (one per exercise)
│   ├── ex01_hello.c
│   ├── ex02_greeting.c
│   ├── ex03_sum.c
│   ├── ex04_calculator.c
│   └── ex05_temperature.c
│
├── tests/              # Shell scripts to test each exercise
│   ├── test_ex01.sh
│   ├── test_ex02.sh
│   ├── test_ex03.sh
│   ├── test_ex04.sh
│   └── test_ex05.sh
│
├── run.sh              # Interactive exercise runner
└── README.md           # Project documentation

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⚙️ Installation

1. Clone this repository

git clone https://github.com/<your-username>/clings.git
cd clings

2. Make the main script executable

chmod +x run.sh

3. Check your environment

You’ll need:

• GCC — for compiling C files
• Bash — for running the interactive interface
• (Optional) Git — for resetting exercises

Verify your setup:

gcc --version
bash --version
git --version

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🚀 Run the Interactive Menu

Start learning by running:

bash run.sh

You’ll see something like this:

Progress: [#########>----------------------------]  2/5
Current exercise: exercises/ex02_greeting.c

h:hint / l:list / c:check / n:next / p:prev / x:reset / q:quit

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🧩 Menu Options

Key	Action	Description
h	hint	Show the “Goal” comment from the current C file
l	list	Display all available exercises
c	check	Compile and test the current exercise
n	next	Go to the next exercise
p	prev	Go to the previous exercise
x	reset	Reset the exercise file to its original Git version
q	quit	Exit the program

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🧠 Example Workflow

1. Launch the tool:

   bash run.sh

2. Press h to get a hint:

   💡 Hint for exercises/ex03_sum.c
     Goal: Write a program that takes two integers and prints their sum.
   

3. Edit exercises/ex03_sum.c using your favorite editor:

   nano exercises/ex03_sum.c

4. When done, press c to check your solution:

   ✅ ex03_sum.c passed all tests!
   

5. Move to the next exercise with n and keep practicing!

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🧪 Testing System

Each file inside tests/ is a Bash test script corresponding to one exercise.
It automatically:

1. Compiles the .c file using gcc
2. Runs it with predefined input
3. Compares the output to expected results
4. Prints success/failure messages

Example:

bash tests/test_ex04.sh

Output:

✅ ex04_calculator.c passed all test cases!

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🔁 Resetting Exercises

If something goes wrong or you want to start fresh, press x in the menu.

This runs:

git checkout -- exercises/ex03_sum.c

⚠️ Works only if your exercises are tracked in Git and committed.

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💡 Tips for Learning

• Each C file starts with a Goal: section describing the task.
• Read the hint before peeking at the solution — it’s designed to guide your thinking.
• Try modifying and re-running tests to explore C behavior.
• Run list (press l) to see all exercises and track your progress.

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🏗️ Roadmap

Feature	Status
Interactive Bash-based CLI	✅ Done
Progress bar tracking	✅ Done
Hint and reset functionality	✅ Done
Colorized terminal output	🔜 Planned
Difficulty levels	🔜 Planned
Makefile automation	🔜 Planned
CI/CD test integration (GitHub Actions)	🔜 Planned

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🧰 Optional: Using Makefile (future support)

To make things even easier, a simple Makefile could let you run:

make run     # Start interactive menu
make test    # Run all test scripts
make clean   # Remove compiled binaries

(You can add this feature later.)

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🖼️ Example Screenshot

Progress: [###########################>------------]  4/5
Current exercise: exercises/ex05_temperature.c

h:hint / l:list / c:check / n:next / p:prev / x:reset / q:quit
💡 Hint for exercises/ex05_temperature.c
  Goal: Write a program that converts Celsius to Fahrenheit and vice versa.

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👤 Author

SherMuhammad
📧 email@example.com
💻 github.com/codebysher

Feel free to fork, star ⭐, and contribute new exercises!

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📜 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License — see the LICENSE file for details.
You can freely use, modify, and distribute it for educational purposes.

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🧠 “Practice doesn’t make perfect — consistent practice makes progress.”