Newbie Question: Where Are the Executables?

I just discovered GnuWin, have downloaded and installed a couple of tools via
the "setup" programs on my Win XP machine. Various doc files get installed in
the Start Menu, but no executables. Am I missing something?

The easiest way to use the tools is to add them to your search path using the
PATH' environment variable, usually by prepending the /bin folder to your PATH variable. You do know how to edit/modify the environment variables on your Windows computer using the System applet (<Windows><break> key) or using theset' command, don't you? You can also use the object libraries in other
applications by including them in your linker search list in a `make' file.
When you compile C or C++ programs you can use the developer header (.h)
files.

c:\program files\gnuwin32\bin

no doubt it gets mentioned while you install it. or is findable by looking in
program files, for the aptly named directory "gnuwin32", and see bin. you can
change to that directory in the command prompt. Or more long term, you can set
the PATH. Either temporarily -

set path=%path%;"c:\program files\gnuwin32\bin"

you may want to prepend it.

Or, more long term.. which is better..

ctrl panel..system..advanced..environment variables

Then look at that long path variable, and put "c:\program files\gnuwin32\bin"
into the list.. Once you've OKed that, then I think maybe no restart
necessary, when you next open a command prompt, it'll have it. type echo
%path% and it should show it.

alanf00 wrote: "am I missing something"

@alanf00: yes, you are missing something.

You didn't know they are command line tools. It could be these tools are not
for you!

mz2pct0 wrote:

<< The easiest way to use the tools is to add them to your search path using
the PATH' environment variable, usually by prepending the /bin folder to your PATH variable. You do know how to edit/modify the environment variables on your Windows computer using the System applet (<Windows><break> key) or using theset' command, don't you? You can also use the object libraries in other
applications by including them in your linker search list in a `make' file.
When you compile C or C++ programs you can use the developer header (.h)
files. >>

<< The easiest way to use the tools is to add them to your search path using
the `PATH' environment variable, usually by prepending the /bin folder to your
PATH variable.>>

Thank you! I eventually figured out how to use the standard Windows XP tools
to do this. The exercise also clued me in on a number of related things.
Apparently the "set" command is roughly equivalent to "set" in Linux.

I finally found out that APPENDING the /bin/folder to the PATH worked.

<< You do know how to edit/modify the environment variables on your Windows
computer using the System applet (<windows><break> key) or using the `set'
command, don't you?>></break></windows>

There is no "<windows><break> key" on my keyboard. I suppose that's a bit odd,
given that the keyboard is labeled "Microsoft" and is roughly six years old.
Any suggestions as to how I might access this function?</break></windows>

<<you can="" also="" use="" the="" object="" libraries="" in="" other="" applications="" by="" including="" them="" your="" linker="" search="" list="" a="" `make'="" file.="" when="" you="" compile="" c="" or="" c++="" programs="" developer="" header="" (.h)="" files.="">></you>

I have no clue what you're talking about here. Remember that I'm a newbie as
to Gnu Windows stuff, but I have plenty of experience as a simple user of
Unix/Linux stuff going back some 30 years (almost always as a user; rarely as
a programmer). I'm not trying to compile stuff at this point; only trying to
install various GNU programs.

Alan Feuerbacher

alanf00@comcast.net

favna wrote:

<< c:\program files\gnuwin32\bin

no doubt it gets mentioned while you install it. or is findable by looking in
program files, for the aptly named directory "gnuwin32", and see bin. you can
change to that directory in the command prompt. Or more long term, you can set
the PATH. Either temporarily - set path=%path%;"c:\program files\gnuwin32\bin"
you may want to prepend it. Or, more long term.. which is better.. ctrl
panel..system..advanced..environment variables Then look at that long path
variable, and put "c:\program files\gnuwin32\bin" into the list.. Once you've
OKed that, then I think maybe no restart necessary, when you next open a
command prompt, it'll have it. type echo %path% and it should show it. >>

Thanks for your many pointers! I checked them all out; found that all of your
suggestions work, more or less.

My problem remains (which I didn't mention initially): I'm trying to install
Freefont. I've downloaded the Windows executable and various GNU/Cygwin
related source files. While all of them seem to compile or install without any
issues, all of them fail to produce an executable file. I've directly
installed Freefont on Cygwin with the same result: no observable executable. I
don't know if I'm completely missing something obvious, or whatever. Any help
will be most appreciated.

<< alanf00 wrote: "am I missing something" @alanf00: yes, you are missing
something. You didn't know they are command line tools. It could be these
tools are not for you! >>

I confess that I was a bit confused about what is and what isn't a command
line tool. Now I know. Thanks. I've been using Unix for some 30 years, but
mostly as a dumb user, not as I'm trying to learn myself around.

Alan Feuerbacher

alanf00@comcast.net

If your keyboard does not have the <windows> key anyware try looking in the
Start Menu for System Tools|System Information|Environment Variables which is
another way to edit the environment variables. The reason you may want to
prepend and not append the folder is to avoid conflict with other Windows
programs. If you don't know how to compile and install programs don't worry
about the object libraries and developer files.</windows>

<< If your keyboard does not have the <windows> key anyware try looking in the
Start Menu for System Tools|System Information|Environment Variables which is
another way to edit the environment variables.>></windows>

Ok, I found that. But I couldn't see any way to edit anything in the displayed
information. What am I missing?

I'm going to look into buying another keyboard, one with the <windows> key.</windows>

<< The reason you may want to prepend and not append the folder is to avoid
conflict with other Windows programs. >>

Ok. However, when looking for more information about this, I saw some comments
that said that prepending might cause such conflict. Any comments? Any idea
where I can learn more about the issues?

<< If you don't know how to compile and install programs don't worry about the
object libraries and developer files. >>

Well, the point of my doing these things is to learn all about compiling and
installing programs. So I want to learn everything I can.

Here's a synopsis of what I've tried in recent weeks: installed Cygwin;
installed several programs on Cygwin; tried to install "Freefont" on Cygwin,
but couldn't find any excutables (Freefont has a GUI so I would expect to find
them); looked at issues with installing Freefont and found a suggestion to
install under MinGW; that led to finding GnuWin and such; installed MinGW and
Msys; found no editor available so tried to install Vim; Vim required
nucurses; couldn't install ncurses until I contacted the maintainer; finally
got ncurses installed; still looking to get Vim installed properly.

So the bottom line of my not finding executables is that Freefont doesn't seem
to create one for its GUI -- unless I'm missing something obvious.

Please note that I'm somewhat familiar with make, and using it to compile my
own relatively simple C programs. I'm trying to learn more about all of this
in my spare time.

Thanks for your help!