This is a cheatsheet for installing libraries in MinGW, be sure to setup a development environment according to this tutorial first: http://www.multigesture.net/articles/how-to-install-mingw-msys-and-eclipse-on-windows/

Libraries

Zlib

• download zlib-1.2.5.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf zlib-1.2.5.tar.gz
• cd zlib-1.2.5
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw
• make
• make install
• gcc -shared -o /mingw/bin/zlib1.dll -Wl,–out-implib=/mingw/lib/libz.dll.a [!em]*.o

Freetype

• download freetype-2.3.12.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf freetype-2.3.12.tar.gz
• cd freetype-2.3.12
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw
• make
• make install

Curl

• download curl-7.20.0.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf curl-7.20.0.tar.gz
• cd curl-7.20.0
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw
• make
• make install

Freeglut

• download freeglut-2.6.0.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf freeglut-2.6.0.tar.gz
• cd freeglut-2.6.0
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw
• make
• make install

Glew

• download glew-1.5.2.zip
• unzip glew-1.5.2.zip
• cd glew-1.5.2
• make
• make install GLEW_DEST=/mingw

SDL

• download SDL-1.2.14.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf SDL-1.2.14.tar.gz
• cd SDL-1.2.14
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw
• make
• make install

Iconv

• download libiconv-1.13.1.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf libiconv-1.13.1.tar.gz
• cd libiconv-1.13.1
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw –enable-static=yes
• make
• make install

Giflib

• download giflib-4.1.6.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf giflib-4.1.6.tar.gz
• cd giflib-4.1.6
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw
• make
• make install

Jpeg

• download jpegsrc.v8a.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf jpegsrc.v8a.tar.gz
• cd jpeg-8a
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw
• make
• make install

Png

• download libpng-1.4.1.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf libpng-1.4.1.tar.gz
• cd libpng-1.4.1
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw
• make
• make install

Tiff

Be sure to apply the patch for building libtiff

• download tiff-3.9.2.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf tiff-3.9.2.tar.gz
• cd tiff-3.9.2
• ./configure –prefix=/mingw
• make
• make install

Libxml2 (Precompiled)

• Download pexports-0.43.zip
• Unzip pexports.exe to C:/MinGW/bin
• Download libxml2-2.7.6.win32.zip
• Unzip libxml2-2.7.6.win32.zip to C:/MinGW

In the shell:

• cd /mingw/bin
• pexports libxml2.dll > libxml2.def
• dlltool –dllname libxml2.dll –def libxml2.def –output-lib ./lib/libxml2.a

Instructions taken from this site and this site

Boost

• download boost_1_42_0.tar.gz
• tar -zxvf boost_1_42_0.tar.gz
• copy boost dir (with header files) to /mingw/include

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15 Comment

./con… doesn’t work on windows ri8?
or is there a way to make it work

06 Apr 2010 Reply

• You need to use msys to compile the libraries. It provides a linux like console and supports ./configure

  21 Apr 2010 Reply

1. Hi Laurence,

   These instructions are a great help. It has been a long time since I’ve done C++ programming, and what I have done wasn’t advanced. So on to my question…

   I’m trying to install zlib. I attempted ./configure…, and I’m getting this message:

   $ ./configure -prefix=/mingw
   Checking for gcc…
   Please use win32/Makefile.gcc instead.

   Then I tried:

   $ make
   Please use ./configure first. Thank you.

   Any ideas?

   Also, zlib-1.2.3 is not available, but 1.2.5 is. I installed 1.2.5. Is that ok?

   Finally, any tips on good books to understand C++ and all this dependency stuff?

   12 May 2010 Reply

   • if you are running windows vista or later, try to run the console (cmd) as administrator and run the normal postinstallation script manually within this console with administrator rights… this solved the problem for me. i didnt get the error message anymore.

     if you want to get zlib-1.2.3: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/libpng/zlib-1.2.3.tar.gz?download

     29 Oct 2010 Reply

2. Any ideas on the “Please use win32/Makefile.gcc instead” message?

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   13 May 2010 Reply

3. I found this in http://www.gaia-gis.it/spatialite-2.4.0/mingw_how_to.html:

   cd zlib123
   cp win32/makefile.gcc makefile.gcc

   That may be what I need.

   13 May 2010 Reply

4. cp win32/makefile.gcc makefile.gcc doesn’t work at all and I cant find anything that works on the net.

   31 May 2010 Reply

5. I was able to compile zlib. Here’s what I did:

   tar –lzma -xvf
   ./msys-build-zlib zlib-1.2.5.tar.bz2
   patch <
   ./configure -prefix=/mingw
   make
   make install
   gcc -shared -o /mingw/bin/zlib1.dll -Wl,–out-implib=/mingw/lib/libz.dll.a [!em]*.o
   make check

   13 Jul 2010 Reply

6. Now I can’t seem to get libtiff to build. Getting a recursive error during link stage (object name conflicts in archive).

   13 Jul 2010 Reply

7. As a variant on what worked for Greg with zlib, what I did was “make -f win32/makefile.gcc”, and then just copied the *.a files into /mingw/lib and the *.exe into /mingw/bin. At that point the example.exe seemed to work.

   20 Sep 2010 Reply

8. The zlib link seems to be dead. Since the rest of the libraries work great, I think it would be great if you found a live link for the newer version. The dead link can be discouraging to n00bs like me.

   29 Apr 2011 Reply

   • @Brian: Thanks for letting me know, I’ve update and changed the URL to the SF mirror. As always you can also visit http://www.zlib.net/ for the most up to date version of zlib.

     03 May 2011 Reply

9. Instead of copying, you should run “make install -f win32/Makefile.gcc”. So, it conforms standard procedure of building from sources under GNU/Linux: “make && make install” chain. Good luck.

   16 Jul 2011 Reply

   • Sorry, before running “make install …”, you should define variables BINARY_PATH, INCLUDE_PATH, LIBRARY_PATH to appropriate mingw folders. Well, read the win32/Makefile.gcc itself

     16 Jul 2011 Reply

10. a) zlib http://www.zlib.net/

    cd into the folder
    If you try to run ./configure from mingw you will probably get “Please use win32/Makefile.gcc instead.”
    Do “make -f win32/Makefile.gcc”
    You will need to add some lines to your path before you can install zlib. Try either of these options. Either way you will run the same make command: ‘make install -f win32/Makefile.gcc’

    option 1: prepend the path variable before you call make: >’BINARY_PATH=/mingw/bin INCLUDE_PATH=/mingw/include LIBRARY_PATH=/mingw/lib make install -f win32/Makefile.gcc’

    option 2: add the path definitions inside your win32/Makefile.gcc file:

    BINARY_PATH=/mingw/bin
    INCLUDE_PATH=/mingw/include
    LIBRARY_PATH=/mingw/lib

    , then install zlib with ‘make install -f win32/Makefile.gcc’

    04 Dec 2011 Reply