playing with GCC 4.6 on windows

Question

I am very pleased to find out that GCC 4.6 supports the range-based for loop. I found an experimental release of MinGW 4.6 on xvidvideo.ru, is that a well-known, reliable website? What other options do I have (besides compiling myself from source code)?

Answer 1

I wanted to try out GCC 4.7 using the latest Code::Blocks under Windows 7.

Here's how I did it for myself, YMMV:

1. I downloaded the latest Equation GCC file at: ftp://ftp.equation.com/gcc/ and installed it under the directory C:\gcc\ on my local machine. The installer makes the necessary changes to the path environment variable. Logging off and on will pick them up.

2. I downloaded the Code::Blocks latest nightly build at: http://forums.codeblocks.org/index.php?board=20.0 and followed the setup instructions.

3. After following the setup instructions (including about the needed DLL files), and starting C::B for the first time;

   I chose 'GNU GCC Compiler', and 'Set as default' for the 'Compilers auto-detection' window.

   Under the 'Settings > Compiler... > Compiler settings' tab: I ticked the 'Have g++ follow the coming C++0x ISO C++ language standard [-std=c++0x]' checkbox on.

   Under the 'Settings > Compiler... > Toolchain executables' tab: I changed the 'Compiler's installation directory' entry field to C:\gcc\bin\.

4. I changed the names of these files physically located in the C:\gcc\bin\ directory

   i686-pc-mingw32-gcc.exe  -=to=-  mingw32-gcc.exe
   
   i686-pc-mingw32-g++.exe  -=to=-  mingw32-g++.exe
   
   make.exe                 -=to=-  mingw32-make.exe
   

   to match the listed name requirements in Code::Blocks. You can simply browse to set the correct files (I just personally preferred renaming to match C::B's entries).

If everything went correctly, you should be able to create this program:

#include <iostream>
#include <vector>

int main() {
    using namespace std;

    vector<int> my_vec = { 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 };
    for (auto x : my_vec) {
        cout << x << endl;
    }
}

and run it OK under Code::Blocks with F9.

Thanks to everyone for all the excellent work put into bringing this great new language to us. Happy C++0x computing!

Bud Alverson (sorry for the very basic nature of this post) :)