使用MinGW的Windows编程

Question

Firstly, please forgive my ignorance regarding these matters, I have done a search and not found any comprehensive answers as of yet.

I plan on learning how to develop for Windows, however I am very fond of the GNU toolchain and don't really want to move onto using big environments like Visual Studio until I feel more comfortable with the underlying basics.

From what I understand, one can download the Windows SDK, which contains the headers and libraries needed to build native Windows applications.

Is the SDK literally just a collection of libraries and headers? If so, as my logic goes, it should be possible to point MinGW towards these libraries/headers, and simply build as normal.

When I build using Visual Studio, I can't see what preprocessor directives are being defined, what is being linked in etc. etc., as I am still learning, I like to be able to know exactly what is going on, preferably so I have to manually define, link etc. Hence the question.

So, what I want to know: is my logic correct?

Again, apologies if the question is rudimentary, I am still learning.

Ps I am planning to develop Windows applications in a windows environment, this is not a question regarding cross-compilation.

Thanks!

Answer 1

MinGW is not compatible with the official Windows SDK, with one of the reasons
being that the SDK contains many VS-specific things (opposed to the GCC base
on MinGW). MinGW has adapted many of the necessary files, and for many programs
this is enough.

You don´t need to know the VS project settings for some program;
MinGW is still GCC in the core and used as such. If you can compile
programs with GCC on linux, learning how to use MinGW won´t be hard.

If you need functions/structures/etc. which are not yet part of it,
you´re out of luck, other than doing the adaption yourself, which
can be everything between very easy or very hard, depending on the case.
Additionally, proper thread usage is a bit quirky (has some "hidden" pitfalls,
which could go unnoticed in an actual program for years, but then...).

(While this is a disadvantage to VS, you´ll get C++11/14 (while VS hasn´t
even finished with 11, see link ), better optimzation in many cases etc.)

If you´re choosing what exactly to download, look at WinGW-W64 instead of
the "original" old one. The original project somewhat stopped, has poor
lib support compared to W64, no 64bit compiler etc. (and don´t misunderstand
the "W64", it can be used for 32bit programs too)