Take the 2-minute tour ×

I have a fresh installation of Ubuntu. I try to install i686-pc-mingw32-c++ required by a third-party Makfile by: sudo apt-get install mingw32, sudo apt-get install mingw32-runtime and sudo apt-get install mingw32-binutils.

However, I only see /usr/bin/i586-mingw32msvc-g++. Where is the compiler I'm looking for?

share|improve this question

migrated from stackoverflow.com Sep 8 '11 at 22:22

This question came from our site for professional and enthusiast programmers.

Are you sure you're looking for MinGW? That's targetting Windows, not Linux. –  MSalters Sep 8 '11 at 8:08

1 Answer 1

up vote 3 down vote accepted

The problem is that gcc cross-compilers can be names differently. It depends on how it is built in the first place. The programs you are referring to (i686-pc-mingw32-g++ and i586-mingw32msvc-g++) are two of the many possibilities when naming the MinGW binaries. But they should behave more or less similarly.

If the third-party Makefile uses this name unconditionally, I'd suggest to change it for your correct one. If you cannot change it, just add a script in your bin directoy that chains to the other compiler, and it'll work transparently.

But if the third-party Makefile uses autoconf (or similar), then you are configuring it wrong.

share|improve this answer

Your Answer


