On Fri, Aug 22, 2008 at 03:52:35PM +0100, Phil Betts wrote:
>John Emmas wrote on Friday, August 22, 2008 1:54 PM::
>
>> Just doing some searches on the internet, there seems to be an awful
>> lot of misinformation / misunderstanding about what the various
>> Cygwin-gcc compiler and linker flags do.
>>
>> For example, I saw one article that said that that flag -mno-cygwin
>> causes an executable to be generated which does *not* require
>> cygwin1.dll to be present on the host machine. That doesn't seem to
>> be true (I've tried it).
>
>If you link with cygwin DLLs, it is the DLLs that require cygwin1.dll,
>not the executable. If you compile with -mno-cygwin, do not link with
>any cygwin DLLs. You wouldn't link with a cygwin DLL if you were
>cross-compiling for Linux; the -mno-cygwin is essentially specifying
>a cross-compilation for a cygwin-free architecture.
>
>Think of it like this:
> gcc -mvegan spaghetti.c -o meal -lparmesan
>will not give you a vegan meal.
>
>
>$ cat >hw.c <<'EOF'
>> #include <stdio.h>
>>
>> int main (int argc, char **argv)
>> {
>> puts ("Hello World");
>> return 0;
>> }
>> EOF
>$ gcc -mno-cygwin hw.c -o hw.exe
>$ cygcheck ./hw.exe
>.\hw.exe
> C:\WINDOWS\system32\msvcrt.dll
> C:\WINDOWS\system32\KERNEL32.dll
> C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntdll.dll
>$ ./hw.exe
>Hello World
>$
>
>I see no trace of cygwin1.dll in the cygcheck output.
>
>
>> I saw another article which said that if you
>> don't use the flag -mwindows, a DOS terminal will open every time you
>> launch your app. That doesn't seem to be true either (at least, not
>> on my machine).
>
>How are you launching it? If you're doing it from a prompt, there's no
>need to open another window. If you double-click on it in an Explorer
>window, you WILL get a DOS box unless you specified -mwindows. Try the
>above example and double click on it. You'll get a DOS box flash up
>momentarily. Recompile using -mwindows, and you won't.
>
>> Is there any resource available where I can find out some
>> (authoritative) information about what the various flags actually do?
>
>From the examples you've given, it seems you've already found some
>authoritative information, but instead of doubting your ability to
>comprehend, you've chosen to doubt the words of others and criticize
>them in a public forum without providing any evidence to back up your
>assertions. Not only is that arrogant, but now YOUR misinformation /
>misunderstanding is out there to cause confusion for others.
>
>It would be nice if the cygwin-specific options were documented in the
>gcc info file, but they don't appear to be. Don't expect -mno-cygwin
>to appear there soon either, because my understanding is that the
>-mno-cygwin option will be removed soon because of the surprising
>number of people who can't seem to grasp the concept of no-cygwin.
Phil is 100% correct here. It's heartening to see someone so thoroughly
getting it after having to so frequently deal with the misconceptions
about -mno-cygwin. Confusion about -mwindows is new though.
I'm counting the days until -mno-cygwin disappears. It is a blight that
must be expunged. I know that as soon as it is gone there will be a
general wail from people who use it but it really should never have been
implemented.
--
Christopher Faylor spammer? -> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cygwin Co-Project Leader
Netapp, Inc.
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