How to install GCC on Windows 7
I've downloaded GCC 4.5.1 and do not know what to do next. I've found instructions inside the Install directory for how to configure, build and install, but I still cannot do much with this. What are step-by-step instructions for how am I supposed to go through this process?
For example, they say something like this:
% mkdir objdir
% cd objdir
% srcdir/configure [options] [target]
And I do understand that the first line creates a directory and the second goes into the directory. But what about third line, and how am I supposed to execute this? Am I supposed to go to source directory and type configure + options + target?
Solution 1:
You don't install GCC like this. You use "Cygwin" or "MSYS" for this purpose (compiling). Cygwin is like a.... Linux-Windows combination? One should read the documentation. In a nutshell: You get a Bash, GCC and other stuff, but it is SLOW.
MSYS is much better on the other hand. It provides a win32 binary of GCC and all the development tools.
If you just want to develop, you should choose a package like this: http://www.codeblocks.org/downloads/26 codeblocks-10.05mingw-setup.exe << This one.
Solution 2:
GCC for Windows is provided by two projects currently. They both provide a very own implementation of the Windows SDK (headers and libraries) which is necessary because GCC does not work with Visual Studio files.
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The older mingw.org, which @Mat already pointed you to. They provide only a 32-bit compiler, and the latest version is GCC 4.5 as of the time of this writing. See here for the downloads you need:
- Binutils is the linker and resource compiler etc.
- GCC is the compiler, and is split in core and language packages
- GDB is the debugger.
- runtime library is required only for mingw.org
- You might need to download mingw32-make seperately.
- For support, you can try (don't expect friendly replies) [email protected]
The newer mingw-w64, which as the name predicts, also provides a 64-bit variant. It is superior in every way to #1 above. You can install with an installer, or find the toolchain files for 32-bit and 64-bit yourself. Alternatively, you can use MSYS2 which provides a huge amount of prebuilt binary packages installable through a package manager, pacman. Note that the MSYS2 toolchains work outside of the MSYS shell just fine; using it as a package manager only is possible. A third option is to use Qt's MinGW packages, which come bundled with a toolchain. For support, send an email to [email protected] or the forum via sourceforge.net.
There are a lot of "non-official" toolchain builders, one of the most popular is TDM-GCC. They may use patches that break binary compatibility with official/unpatched toolchains, so be careful using them. It's best to use the official releases (or in the case of mingw-w64, the Personal builds are easier to get started with).
Re the other answer: Cygwin/MSYS != GCC. Using GCC does not require the other. Plain users shouldn't be compiling GCC. That process is waaay to involved and time-consuming. Enough binary distributions floating around...
Solution 3:
GCC is available through Chocolatey:
choco install mingw -y
Restart the command prompt and you should be able to run gcc.