Algorithm Visualization tool for C?

Are there existing algorithm visualization tool for C programs? like visualizing an execution of a C program through animated execution stack.

5 Answers

I recommend ddd for fancy GUI debugging visualizations. It visualizes all the data structures and makes pretty graphs and gives you access to your regular debugger.

Oracle Studio for Linux (former Sun Studio) Performance Analyzer has the timeline feature. That is exactly an animated stack representation.

Like on this screenshot:

For C++, there are educational program visualizers that you might want to try:

• VIP (Visual InterPreter), you should be able to visualize your own code by editing one of the examples on the site. Supports only a C++ subset, though.
• The Teaching Machine, can be used as a Java program or an Eclipse plugin.

EDIT: Updated the The Teaching Machine link.

You can try ollydbg with the ollyflow plugin, or have a look at IDA with its call graphing plugin (there are other plugins along these lines as well).

C Tutor - Visualize C code execution to learn C online

Is a great tool for visualizing the workflow of your C/C++ code - as well as a number of other languages. To my knowledge you cannot enter any command line arguments, but that's the only limitation I can think of. The benefits are that it is free, web based, and very intuitive.