Part 1: Setting up the base system
The base system consist of the GCC compiler, the MinGW-w64 runtime, and MSYS utilities.
The compiler abd the runtime are provided by packages from the MinGW-builds project. MSYS provides a UNIX-like shell environment.
Content
We begin by installing the MinGW Installation Manager. This program will allows us to install MinGW and MSYS packages. The MSYS packages provide the shell and the necessary command line tools, but we will not use the Installation Manager to install the MinGW compiler suite.
Download the MingGW Installation Manager setup:
Run the installer. Click the Install button to accept the license and continue.
Specify the installation directory, the default C:\MinGW is usually approriate. Review the other options and click the Continue button to begin the installation.
Wait until the installation has finished and click the Continue button.
We use the MinGW Installation Manager to install MSYS packages:
Select Basic Setup on the left side of the screen. Mark the following packages to install:
- mingw-developer-toolkit
- msys-base
Open the Installation menu and click Apply Changes.
Click the Apply button.
Patiently wait for the installation to complete.
Click the Close button upon completion.
Install a number of additional packages, select All Packages on the left of the screen and mark the following packages for installation:
- msys-rxvt
- msys-unzip
- msys-wget
- msys-zip
Install the packages with the same procedure: open the Installation menu and click Apply Changes, click the Apply button, press the Close button upon completion.
Next, we create a new shortcut to launch the MSYS shell. CLick on the desktop with the right mouse button, select New -> Shortcut.
Set the location to C:\MinGW\msys\1.0\msys.bat, and call it MSYS Shell.
- Target: C:\MinGW\msys\1.0\msys.bat --rxvt
- Start in: C:\MinGW\msys\1.0\bin
Launch the MSYS Shell by double-clicking the shortcut.
You can paste clipboard text to the RXVT terminal with the shift+insert key combination, hence can copy the commands from this guide and paste them into the terminal window.
If you use the mouse to select text in the RXVT window, it will be automatically copied to the clipboard as well.
MinGW is a port of the GCC compiler to the win32 platform. MinGW-W64 adds 64-bit support and an improved windows runtime.
Before installing the compiler, a little bit of cleanup has to be done: the MinGW Installation Manager has put a number of packages into C:\MinGW\mingw32, rename it to C:\MinGW\mingw.dist.
mv /c/MinGW/mingw32 /c/MinGW/mingw.dist
Download the i686 package:
- Sourceforge: i686-4.8.2-release-win32-sjlj-rt_v3-rev1.7z
- Local mirror: i686-4.8.2-release-win32-sjlj-rt_v3-rev1.7z
If you want to build 64-bit applications, you'll also need the x86_64 package:
- Sourceforge: x86_64-4.8.2-release-win32-seh-rt_v3-rev1.7z
- Local mirror: x86_64-4.8.2-release-win32-seh-rt_v3-rev1.7z
Unzip the compiler packages into the C:\MinGW directory, you can use the 7-zip utility, or any archiver that understands the 7z format. You should and up with two new subdirectories: C:\MinGW\mingw32 and C:\MinGW\mingw64.
These packages support the win32 threading model and do not support C11 threading. Building GTK fails using the POSIX threading packages.
References:
MSYS emulates a UNIX file system hierarchy. By default, the MSYS directory C:\MinGW\msys\1.0 will be mounted as root directory / and as /usr. Traditional windows drives like D: and E: can be accessed as /d or /e. Use the mount command to get an overview:
$ mount C:\Users\Ingar\AppData\Local\Temp on /tmp type user (binmode,noumount) C:\MinGW\msys\1.0 on /usr type user (binmode,noumount) C:\MinGW\msys\1.0 on / type user (binmode,noumount) c: on /c type user (binmode,noumount) d: on /d type user (binmode,noumount)
Mount the installation directory of the custom compiler package in a convenient location:
mount 'C:\MinGW\mingw32\' /mingw32 mount 'C:\MinGW\mingw64\' /mingw64
We will add a number of extra directories to /etc/fstab, to be mounted whenever a new shell is started: /opt, where we will install a few extra packages, /sources, where downloads will be saved, /build32 where we will download the sourcode and compile packages, and /local32, where we will install our own compiled packages. These directories can be anywhere, but to keep the setup simple and consistent we will create C:\MinGW\opt, C:\MinGW\build32 and C:\MinGW\local32 and mount them as /opt, /build32 and /local32.
Additionally, we create a 64-bit variant for each of the 32-bit directories. Note that the /sources directory is the same for both environments, this prevents having to download source packages twice.
Create the necessary directories:
mkdir /c/mingw/{opt,build32,local32,build64,local64,sources}
Mount the directories, this will automaticly add them to /etc/fstab:
umount /mingw mount 'C:\MinGW' /mingw mount 'C:\MinGW\opt\' /opt mount 'C:\MinGW\local32\' /local32 mount 'C:\MinGW\build32\' /build32 mount 'C:\MinGW\local64\' /local64 mount 'C:\MinGW\build64\' /build64 mount 'C:\MinGW\sources\' /sources
Create necessary subdirectories in /local32, /local64 and /opt:
mkdir /opt/bin /local{32,64}/{bin,etc,include,lib,share}
mkdir /local{32,64}/lib/pkgconfig
Create /local32/etc/profile.local:
cat > /local32/etc/profile.local << "EOF" # # /local32/etc/profile.local # alias dir='ls -la --color=auto' alias ls='ls --color=auto' PKG_CONFIG_PATH="/local32/lib/pkgconfig" CPPFLAGS="-I/local32/include" CFLAGS="-I/local32/include -mms-bitfields -mthreads -mtune=pentium3" CXXFLAGS="-I/local32/include -mms-bitfields -mthreads -mtune=pentium3" LDFLAGS="-L/local32/lib -mthreads" export PKG_CONFIG_PATH CPPFLAGS CFLAGS CXXFLAGS LDFLAGS PATH=".:/local32/bin:/mingw32/bin:/mingw/bin:/bin:/opt/bin" PS1='\[\033[32m\]\u@\h \[\033[33m\w\033[0m\]$ ' export PATH PS1 # directory where sources will be downloaded LOCALSOURCEDIR=/sources # package build directory LOCALBUILDDIR=/build32 # package installation prefix LOCALDESTDIR=/local32 export LOCALBUILDDIR LOCALDESTDIR EOF
Create /local64/etc/profile.local:
cat > /local64/etc/profile.local << "EOF" # # /local64/etc/profile.local # alias dir='ls -la --color=auto' alias ls='ls --color=auto' PKG_CONFIG_PATH="/local64/lib/pkgconfig" CPPFLAGS="-I/local64/include" CFLAGS="-I/local64/include -mms-bitfields -mthreads" CXXFLAGS="-I/local64/include -mms-bitfields -mthreads" LDFLAGS="-L/local64/lib" export PKG_CONFIG_PATH CPPFLAGS CFLAGS CXXFLAGS LDFLAGS PATH=".:/local64/bin:/mingw64/bin:/mingw/bin:/bin:/opt/bin" PS1='\[\033[32m\]\u@\h \[\033[33m\w\033[0m\]$ ' export PATH PS1 # directory where sources will be downloaded LOCALSOURCEDIR=/sources # package build directory LOCALBUILDDIR=/build64 # package installation prefix LOCALDESTDIR=/local64 export LOCALBUILDDIR LOCALDESTDIR EOF
Make sure it is executed on login:
cat >> /etc/profile << "EOF"
if [ -f /local32/etc/profile.local ]; then
source /local32/etc/profile.local
fi
EOF
Apply the new settings:
source /local32/etc/profile.local
Note that the default environment is 32-bit. You can switch to the 64-bit environment with the following command:
source /local64/etc/profile.local
(Skip this section if you don't want to use the VIM editor)
Create a configuration file for VIM:
cat > ~/.vimrc << "EOF" " Configuration file for VIM set nocompatible set bs=2 " allow backspacing over everything in insert mode set ai " set autoindenting on " set backup " keep a backup file set nobackup " do not keep a backup file set history=256 " keep 256 lines of command line history set ruler " show the cursor position all the time set tabstop=8 " tab at 4 characters set shiftwidth=8 " 4 characters indentation set nowrap " do not wrap long lines set visualbell " no bell set background=light " msys rxvt has a light background "set background=dark " mingw shell uses a black background syntax on " syntax highlighting on EOF
Set vim as default editor in the 32-bit environment:
cat >> /local32/etc/profile.local << "EOF" EDITOR=vim export EDITOR EOF
In the 64-bit environment:
cat >> /local64/etc/profile.local << "EOF" EDITOR=vim export EDITOR EOF
We install a few third-party tools in /opt to prevent them from interfering with the default packages.
Download and install the 7zip command line package:
cd ${LOCALSOURCEDIR} && \
wget -c "http://downloads.sourceforge.net/sevenzip/7za920.zip" && \
cd /opt/bin && \
unzip ${LOCALSOURCEDIR}/7za920.zip && \
mkdir -p ../doc/7za920 && \
mv license.txt readme.txt 7-zip.chm ../doc/7za920
Download and install the Portable Git package from msysgit:
cd ${LOCALSOURCEDIR} && \
wget -c "http://msysgit.googlecode.com/files/PortableGit-1.8.4-preview20130916.7z" && \
cd /opt && \
7za x ${LOCALSOURCEDIR}/PortableGit-1.8.4-preview20130916.7z && \
rm git-bash.bat git-cmd.bat 'Git Bash.vbs' && \
mv ReleaseNotes.rtf README.portable doc/git
Download and install the win32 subversion client using the following commands:
cd ${LOCALSOURCEDIR} && \
wget -c "http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/win32svn/1.8.5/apache22/svn-win32-1.8.5.zip" && \
cd ${LOCALBUILDDIR} && \
unzip ${LOCALSOURCEDIR}/svn-win32-1.8.5.zip && \
cp -va svn-win32-1.8.5/* /opt && \
mkdir -p /opt/doc/svn-win32-1.8.5 && \
mv /opt/README.txt /opt/doc/svn-win32-1.8.5
Download and install the win32 cmake client using the following commands:
cd ${LOCALSOURCEDIR} && \
wget -c "http://www.cmake.org/files/v2.8/cmake-2.8.12.1-win32-x86.zip" && \
cd ${LOCALBUILDDIR} && \
unzip ${LOCALSOURCEDIR}/cmake-2.8.12.1-win32-x86.zip && \
cp -va cmake-2.8.12.1-win32-x86/* /opt
The following sections of this guide describe how to build various local packages. If you do not want to build them yourself, you can download my build:
- 32-bit local packages with GTK+
- msys-2013-12-14-local32-gtk.7z
- 64-bit local packages with GTK+
- msys-2013-12-14-local64-gtk.7z
These packages should be extracted into the main installation directory C:\MinGW, you should end up with C:\MinGW\mingw32 and/or C:\MinGW\mingw64.
Remember you can always switch between environments by reading the apporiate profile:
To switch to the 32-bit build environment:
source /local32/etc/profile.local
To switch to the 64-bit build environment:
source /local64/etc/profile.local
