Using a MinGW as tool_requires to build with gcc in Windows¶

If we had MinGW installed in our environment, we could define a profile like:

[settings]
os=Windows
compiler=gcc
compiler.version=12
compiler.libcxx=libstdc++11
compiler.threads=posix
compiler.exception=sjlj
arch=x86_64
build_type=Release

[buildenv]
PATH+=(path)C:/path/to/mingw/bin
# other environment we might need like
CXX=C:/path/to/mingw/bin/g++
# etc

[conf]
# some configuration like 'tools.build:compiler_executables' might be needed for some cases

But we can also use a Conan package that contains a copy of the MinGW compiler and use it as a tool_requires instead:

mingw-profile.txt¶

[settings]
os=Windows
compiler=gcc
compiler.version=12
compiler.libcxx=libstdc++11
compiler.threads=posix
compiler.exception=seh
arch=x86_64
build_type=Release


[tool_requires]
mingw-builds/12.2.0

With this profile we can for example create a package in Windows with:

# Using a basic template project
$ conan new cmake_lib -d name=mypkg -d version=0.1
$ conan create . -pr=mingw
...
-- The CXX compiler identification is GNU 12.2.0
...


======== Testing the package: Executing test ========
mypkg/0.1 (test package): Running test()
mypkg/0.1 (test package): RUN: .\example
mypkg/0.1: Hello World Release!
mypkg/0.1: _M_X64 defined
mypkg/0.1: __x86_64__ defined
mypkg/0.1: _GLIBCXX_USE_CXX11_ABI 1
mypkg/0.1: MSVC runtime: MultiThreadedDLL
mypkg/0.1: __cplusplus201703
mypkg/0.1: __GNUC__12
mypkg/0.1: __GNUC_MINOR__2
mypkg/0.1: __MINGW32__1
mypkg/0.1: __MINGW64__1
mypkg/0.1 test_package