Subject: Re: Cygwin, MingW32
From: "Paul Garceau" <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2000 16:07:30 -0800

Hi folks,

On 5 Nov 2000, at 1:46, the Illustrious McNulty Junior Bobby wrote:

> Let's pretend for a minute.
> Let's say I have a code written for a Unix computer.
> Let's say it needs to use Win32 multimediA. I am not
> using anything from Win32 except mmysstem.h and
> related stuff.
> i want the program to run under the Cygwin Dll but
> using windows devices.
> 1) is it possible?

	Yes.  if you wish to build a plain vanilla Unix app, that app 
will build and run on both the Unix and the Win32 platform for 
as long as you restrict your calls to the standard C/C++ runtime 
calls and/or your own systems interface.

> 2) How would I set up the necessary flags to call unix?

	What kind of interface are you needing?  The graphics interface 
and the multimedia interface are different and therefore require 
different calls.  The system architectures are also different 
between Unix and the Win32 API.

	Are you really wanting to call Unix (Again, graphics or other)?

	If so, then you will need to have at least OpenGL for Unix (for 
graphics) as OpenGL is the only API that can run, with little or 
no changes, on both the Unix and the Win32 based systems 
platforms.

	If the former case (win32 based system platform), you will need 
to write the necessary drivers, if they don't already exist.  
ie. You will need to put together a gxx based application that 
uses the appropriate drivers, etc.

	Continuing in this vein, depending on the Win32 platform you 
are targetting, there are different requirements in terms of 
system support.
	Recommendations at this time are to target either the win2k 
platform or for a Win9x platform as these are the only two that 
can handle the latest versions of DirectX (NT4 is no longer 
being supported in terms of MS system certifications by MS.)

	If, in fact, you would like to (or need to) build for NT4, you 
will need to find a set of certain headers in order to support 
the bastardized version of multimedia/graphics that currently 
exists under NT4.  There will be no more updates to the NT4 
(system) multimedia/graphics levels past Service Pack-6 or -6a 
(SP6-6a) with very few exceptions (most exceptions have to do 
with lax internet security for Win32 API and involve the 
installation of the weekly security patch releases from MS for 
their internet based apps, both client and server).

Question 2:

	There is no need to call Unix if you are building a pure Win32 
interface and the -mno-cygwin switch is set.

	Under the current version of Cygwin, (the -mno-cygwin portion 
is currently being updated) you can use the -mno-cygwin switch 
(gcc/g++) to invoke the mingw headers within the Cygwin 
development environment.

	You can build a Unix console app (sans special Unix drivers) 
that will run on a Win32 platform within the Cygwin API.

	The Cygwin API was designed to function as an app which allows 
the use of a Unix-like interface within a Win32 based system 
environment.

	Peace,

		Paul G.
 
> 
> =====
> Robert McNulty Junior
> Chief Programmer/System Administrar
> Sherlock Audio Produictions
> Robert McNulty Junior (C) 2000
> 
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