[Mingw-users] Re: what's the advantage of installing MinGW next to Cygwin

[Raoul G. <Rao...@ya...>]

"Wolfgang Spraul" <ws...@q-...> wrote in message
news:200...@q-......
> I'm about to write a DLL that should not depend on
cygwin1.dll. -mno-cygwin
> works fine, the DLL builds and has no cygwin dependencies.
>
> However, the MinGW FAQ says "a much easier option to '-mno-cygwin'
does exist"
> and then explains how to install the 'native' MinGW alongside
Cygwin.
>
> Now I have some questions:
>
> 1) Why is it "easier" to install mingw alongside Cygwin than to use
the
> -mno-cygwin?

For building one DLL, assuming that you're writing it in C, there
shouldn't be any problem. However, in the longer term, I think the
native MinGW compiler is much easier to use if you want to avoid the
Cygwin1.dll dependency. Here are my experiences using -mno-cygwin from
a year or so back:

The first problem was that libstdc++ is compiled *with* Cygwin.dll
dependencies, so you can't actually get real independence for your C++
code. What I did then was install STLport as an alternative standard
C++ library, but building it in -mno-cygwin mode was fairly difficult.
The same is true of the Boost libraries, which build easily for Cygwin
*or* MinGW, but not -mno-cygwin. I actually contributed my work
sorting out the problems to Boost, but I wouldn't really recommend it
to you.

Basically, if you're developing in C++, or you want to use source
libraries from third parties, you will always have extra hassle
using -mno-cygwin (even if it's just changing the compiler flags in
one Makefile per library). Maybe things have changed since then, but I
doubt it.

>
> 2) What MinGW functionality is missing in the Cygwin packages
gcc-mingw,
> w32api, mingw-runtime? Will there be additional Cygwin packages in
the future
> (mingw-utils)?

As far as I know, it's all in there. You also have the niceties like a
Tk GUI for GDB, which you don't have with MinGW (OK if you like that
kind of thing). I have a kind of mixture on my system, but I
definitely rely more on the MinGW compiler, and don't mess around
with -mno-cygwin any more.

>
> 3) Is my assumption correct that the MinGW development happens on
the sf.net
> project, so the Cygwin packages are usually older versions? The
latest Cygwin
> has gcc-mingw 2002-0817-4, mingw-runtime 2.3-1 and w32api 2.1-1.
Looks fairly
> recent to me.
>
> 4) Are there any tools in the MinGW native files (from sf.net) that
are not in
> the Cygwin packages (pexports?)?
>
> 5) What is the advantage of using the non-Cygwin msys tools over
using the
> Cygwin tools?

The only thing I can think of is with automatic build configuration
utilities. I actually use the Cygwin bash, becuase I've never bothered
downloading MSys. Sometimes I have to override configure's host
detection mechanisms (because it starts building the Cygwin version of
something like gcc, when I want the MinGW version instead).

Regards,
Raoul Gough.