5 ms·

Yes, we are very concurrent with Cygwin. We have a modern Github-centric approach to software development and use ArchLinux's Pacman so like them are a rolling

Yes, we are very concurrent with Cygwin. We have a modern Github-centric approach to software development and use ArchLinux's Pacman so like them are a rolling software distribution. We hope that other software projects will use us as their library provider and build enviornment on Windows, as that way it should be easier for them to also keep up to date. Unlike the old MSYS, we are also 64-bit and that allows using --enable-auto-image-base which means no more needing to rebase your DLLs. Also, Cygwin have made great strides over the many years since MSYS forked from them and it is now both much faster and more standards compliant. Git-4-Windows is also based on MSYS2 now and some day (hopefully soon) we will fully merge their work (a lot has been merged already) and use their native git executable.

2bitencryption 11y ago
Sorry for the basic questions, but the github page (and SourceForge page) aren't answering all of my beginner's questions... If Msys2 is Cygwin-derived, does that mean all packages in the Msys2-Pacman are all Cygwin packages? I.e., making this "Cygwin with Pacman as a package manager?" Does this also mean Msys2 packages can never be more current than Cygwin packages (not that this is a bad thing, but as far as I know Python3 in Cygwin is still < 3.5). Is the benefit of Msys2 that some packages could be native windows builds instead of Cygwin-dll reliant packages?
- RayDonnelly 11y ago
  This has been answered before. No, the msys2 repo doesn't follow the Cygwin packaging versions or schedules at all. They are built from the recipes at: https://github.com/Alexpux/MSYS2-packages https://github.com/Alexpux/MSYS2-packages .. they link to msys-2.0.dll which is Cygwin derived and are thus GPLed and exist to provide a POSIX-y shell and build tools to allow building: https://github.com/Alexpux/MINGW-packages https://github.com/Alexpux/MINGW-packages .. which are full of native Windows software under various licenses.
  - e12e 11y ago
    Is there some more documentation on how msys2 relates to mingw somewhere? I recently came across msys2 when half-heartedly trying to compile Darktable[1] for windows 10. As far as I can tell, msys2 is still posix/GNU for windows, with alternate shell (bash, not powershell etc) and alternate filesystem (posix/gnu-like)? While mingw is/was gnu/posix binaries for windows. Both have their place -- but I'd be really happy if something akin to msys2 was available more like mingw -- so I could use the (now finally quite usable) standard windows command line along with (hopefully) MS compilers and have some hope of compiling stuff that uses automake etc. As far as I can figure out, msys2 doesn't (try to) help with that? It's more like a GNU chroot that runs under windows? In which case most/many use-cases might be better served with a vm under VirtualBox/hyper-v[2] and/or a true "native" windows port? Not meant as criticism of the project, I'm just trying to figure out if I've understood the focus of msys2 correctly. Finally, for those wishing for "more GNU" on windows, one of the most pleasant discoveries I've made, is the scoop package manager: http://scoop.sh/ http://scoop.sh/ [1] http://www.darktable.org/install/ http://www.darktable.org/install/ [2] Especially if/when Vagrant works out of the box with hyper-v -- I'm not quite clear on the current status, but looks like it's been enabled and is included in default Vagrant now: https://www.vagrantup.com/docs/hyperv/index.html https://www.vagrantup.com/docs/hyperv/index.html
    - RayDonnelly 11y ago
      > As far as I can tell, msys2 is still posix/GNU for windows, with alternate shell (bash, not powershell etc) and alternate filesystem (posix/gnu-like)? While mingw is/was gnu/posix binaries for windows The M in MSYS2 stands for Minimal. Meaning the Cygwin-y part is as small as is necessary to run a shell, bash and autotools to configure and build native Windows software that links to msvcrt.dll with no dependency on the Cygwin derived msys-2.0.dll what-so-ever. The software built from the recipes here: https://github.com/Alexpux/MINGW-packages https://github.com/Alexpux/MINGW-packages .. does not link to the GPLed msys-2.0.dll. It is built with mingw-w64 GCC. The focus of the project is to expand that collection of software.
      - e12e 11y ago
aidenn0 11y ago
Thanks for answering! I'll have to check it out. Fortunately I don't spend much time on windows these days, and I had switched to babun from msys because of so many deficiencies in their old cygwin fork.
- RayDonnelly 11y ago
  Babun brings nothing to the table. I hate what they did to the apt-cyg copyright notices. Bad behaviour.

2bitencryption 11y ago

Sorry for the basic questions, but the github page (and SourceForge page) aren't answering all of my beginner's questions... If Msys2 is Cygwin-derived, does that mean all packages in the Msys2-Pacman are all Cygwin packages? I.e., making this "Cygwin with Pacman as a package manager?" Does this also mean Msys2 packages can never be more current than Cygwin packages (not that this is a bad thing, but as far as I know Python3 in Cygwin is still < 3.5). Is the benefit of Msys2 that some packages could be native windows builds instead of Cygwin-dll reliant packages?

RayDonnelly 11y ago
This has been answered before. No, the msys2 repo doesn't follow the Cygwin packaging versions or schedules at all. They are built from the recipes at: https://github.com/Alexpux/MSYS2-packages https://github.com/Alexpux/MSYS2-packages .. they link to msys-2.0.dll which is Cygwin derived and are thus GPLed and exist to provide a POSIX-y shell and build tools to allow building: https://github.com/Alexpux/MINGW-packages https://github.com/Alexpux/MINGW-packages .. which are full of native Windows software under various licenses.
- e12e 11y ago
  Is there some more documentation on how msys2 relates to mingw somewhere? I recently came across msys2 when half-heartedly trying to compile Darktable[1] for windows 10. As far as I can tell, msys2 is still posix/GNU for windows, with alternate shell (bash, not powershell etc) and alternate filesystem (posix/gnu-like)? While mingw is/was gnu/posix binaries for windows. Both have their place -- but I'd be really happy if something akin to msys2 was available more like mingw -- so I could use the (now finally quite usable) standard windows command line along with (hopefully) MS compilers and have some hope of compiling stuff that uses automake etc. As far as I can figure out, msys2 doesn't (try to) help with that? It's more like a GNU chroot that runs under windows? In which case most/many use-cases might be better served with a vm under VirtualBox/hyper-v[2] and/or a true "native" windows port? Not meant as criticism of the project, I'm just trying to figure out if I've understood the focus of msys2 correctly. Finally, for those wishing for "more GNU" on windows, one of the most pleasant discoveries I've made, is the scoop package manager: http://scoop.sh/ http://scoop.sh/ [1] http://www.darktable.org/install/ http://www.darktable.org/install/ [2] Especially if/when Vagrant works out of the box with hyper-v -- I'm not quite clear on the current status, but looks like it's been enabled and is included in default Vagrant now: https://www.vagrantup.com/docs/hyperv/index.html https://www.vagrantup.com/docs/hyperv/index.html
  - RayDonnelly 11y ago
    > As far as I can tell, msys2 is still posix/GNU for windows, with alternate shell (bash, not powershell etc) and alternate filesystem (posix/gnu-like)? While mingw is/was gnu/posix binaries for windows The M in MSYS2 stands for Minimal. Meaning the Cygwin-y part is as small as is necessary to run a shell, bash and autotools to configure and build native Windows software that links to msvcrt.dll with no dependency on the Cygwin derived msys-2.0.dll what-so-ever. The software built from the recipes here: https://github.com/Alexpux/MINGW-packages https://github.com/Alexpux/MINGW-packages .. does not link to the GPLed msys-2.0.dll. It is built with mingw-w64 GCC. The focus of the project is to expand that collection of software.
    - e12e 11y ago

aidenn0 11y ago

Thanks for answering! I'll have to check it out. Fortunately I don't spend much time on windows these days, and I had switched to babun from msys because of so many deficiencies in their old cygwin fork.

RayDonnelly 11y ago
Babun brings nothing to the table. I hate what they did to the apt-cyg copyright notices. Bad behaviour.