Hello World C program on the EV3

I have been programming the EV3 using LeJOS (basically Java) for a few weeks now, but the desire to use a truly low-level language such as C to control the robot has not gone away. I took a significant first step in that direction by acquiring a cross-compiler and using it to successfully write and compile a Hello World program that basically prints the infamous string on stdout. Since my computer runs Linux on the x86 architecture while the EV3 runs on an ARM 9 architecture, a cross-compiler is needed on my x86 to take source code (in C) and compile it for the ARM 9 architecture. After compilation the executable can be placed in the EV3 and executed at will. Having a cross-compiler allows me to develop on my PC (a much faster approach) and simply push binaries (executables) to the EV3 for execution. This site/blog explains how to acquire the cross-compiler while this associated section explains how to write and compile the Hello World program. The blog has more complex examples to do with controlling the sensors and motors but that will have to wait for another day.