Re: MinGW build instructions

Eli Zaretskii
2005-05-11T18:45:07Z

> Date: Wed, 11 May 2005 12:11:53 -0400
> From: Christopher Faylor <me@cgf.cx>
>
> You don't have to install 700MB of cygwin to get things working. You
> should be able to get away with just installing the bits that you need +
> the mingw compiler. Or, it is possible that a i686-pc-mingw32-gcc
> wrapper like:
>
> #!/bin/sh
> exec gcc -mno-cygwin "$@"
>
> may "just work" with the cygwin version of gcc. The -mno-cygwin option
> to gcc actually uses the mingw headers and libraries. Unfortunately,
> there is a problem with cygwin-bleedover for libraries, though, so
> you have to be careful not to specify any libraries on the command
> line which exist on cygwin but not in mingw. This is something that
> I keep meaning to fix in gcc/binutils...

Thanks for the info.

However, what is needed are precise instructions based on actual
experience. If I were someone who needs for the first time compile a
GNU package on Windows, it would not help me to know that
such-and-such setup ``might just work''. The subtleties of running
various ports of GNU tools on Windows are not something a newbie
should need to learn as part of their first job. If someone knows
exactly how to set up a build environment where the MinGW port of GDB
can be built, please describe that. In particular, what parts of
Cygwin need to be installed and how to run the compiler.

Also, the configuration that you suggest: some part of Cygwin and the
MinGW compiler, will probably suffer from incompatibilities due to
Cygwin file names that the MinGW compiler probably doesn't understand,
symlinks that the utilities such as ln support, but the MinGW compiler
might not, etc. I didn't try MSYS, but it sounds that they did
resolve these problems in a more satisfactory manner. So I don't
really understand why you don't like their alternative. Is it known
to have some serious problems?