There are various high level language compilers for 8051 or enhanced versions of 8051 from various vendors. The most popular is the C language

C (programming language)

C is a general-purpose computer programming language developed between 1969 and 1973 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system....

 compiler. As the modern C compilers are efficient, assembly language is seldom used nowadays. It is common to have a complete program written solely in C including interrupt service routines. C language, being a high level language, has many important advantages over assembly language like portability, automatic proper handling of various data types including data arithmetic, ease of data organization, ease of expressing program logic, etc. It is much easier to write a program in C than in assembly language. C language programming is also much less error prone.

All C compilers for 8051 have extensions to cater to the 8051 architecture. Important ones are the various memory spaces (internal RAM, code space, external RAM space), special function registers and bit variables.

With the knowledge of the 8051 architecture, a beginner can quickly write useful programs for 8051 in C, totally bypassing the need to know the 8051's assembly language instructions. This is a proven approach for learning 8051 programming.

C compilers

• SDCC
  Small Device C Compiler
  The Small Device C Compiler is an open source, partially retargetable C compiler for microcontrollers. It is distributed under the GNU General Public License. The package also contains a linker, assembler, simulator and debugger...
  
   is a completely free (GPL), but lacks integrated development environment
  Integrated development environment
  An integrated development environment is a software application that provides comprehensive facilities to computer programmers for software development...
  
  . Although, it is very easy to incorporate it to most Open-Source IDE.

Proprietary

Proprietary software

Proprietary software is computer software licensed under exclusive legal right of the copyright holder. The licensee is given the right to use the software under certain conditions, while restricted from other uses, such as modification, further distribution, or reverse engineering.Complementary...

 payware

Commercial software

Commercial software, or less commonly, payware, is computer software that is produced for sale or that serves commercial purposes.Commercial software is most often proprietary software, but free software packages may also be commercial software....

:

• KEIL
  KEIL
  Keil was founded in 1982 by Günter und Reinhard Keil, initially as a German GbR. In April 1985 the company was converted to Keil Elektronik GmbH to market add-on products for the development tools provided by many of the silicon vendors...
  
  
• Raisonance
• IAR Systems
  IAR Systems
  IAR Systems is a Swedish computer technology company working in the area of embedded system development tools. IAR Systems was founded in 1983, and is listed on NASDAQ OMX, Stockholm....
  
  
• MikroElektronika, 8051 compiler contains a comprehensive library functions for peripherals with circuit diagram.
• Tasking
• Crossware
• Dunfield
• Wickenhäuser
• SPJ Embedded Technologies, India

External links

• SDCC
• Keil C
• IAR Systems C/C++
• MikroElektronika C
• Tasking C
• Bascom51 Basic compiler
• turbo51 Pascal
• Forth