'msys2' / 'mingw' Notes

The msys2 / mingw project is now hosted at

• https://www.msys2.org/wiki/MSYS2-installation/

An installer for a package that only runs on 64 bit Windows but can also build binaries for 32 bit Windows can be downloaded at

• https://repo.msys2.org/distrib/x86_64/

Download file msys2-x86_64-20220603.exe or newer.

Development of a package that runs on 32 bit Windows has been discontinued, but earlier packages are still available at

• https://repo.msys2.org/distrib/i686/

Download file msys2-i686-20200517.exe, which is the latest version.

Run the downloaded file to install the base packet.

In current installations, it should be sufficient to run

pacman -Syuu

Note: in an installation on Windows 7 32 bit the command updated some basic programs, then asked to close the msys shell and re-open it before continuing by repeating the command. However, it was impossible to re-open a new shell until the machine had been rebooted. So the older way described below for older versions may be generally preferred.

In older installations, updates may need to be run in 2 steps:

First update programs that may be in use:

pacman --needed -S bash pacman pacman-mirrors msys2-runtime

If any packages have been updated, you have to close and re-run the MSYS2 shell before continuing.

Then run

pacman -Syu

to update the remaining packages.

Note: In the examples below, a WKD key server is explicitly specified because older installations may use the obsolete pool.

If a PGP key is missing or has expired, run the following command to refresh all keys:

pacman-key --keyserver hkp://keyserver.ubuntu.com:80 --refresh-keys

It's possible that the command above has to be run several times to fetch all required keys.

If a key is still missing or can't be updated automatically, import the key manually:

pacman-key --keyserver hkp://keyserver.ubuntu.com:80 -r 5F944B027F7FE2091985AA2EFA11531AA0AA7F57

Then edit the key to increase the trust level. Run

pacman-key --edit-key 5F944B027F7FE2091985AA2EFA11531AA0AA7F57

then enter trust, select level 4 (full), and enter save to save the changes.

Note: in an installation on Windows 7 32 bit level 4 was not saved. The increased trust level was only saved when level '5' (ultimate) was selected. Car must also be taken that the appropriate key for 'y' is pressed (in German, 'j') to accept the level.

Then repeat the command from the basic installation

pacman -Syu

Toolchain to build 32 bit Windows binaries:

pacman -S --needed base-devel mingw-w64-i686-toolchain

Toolchain to build 64 bit Windows binaries (can be used on 64 bit Windows only):

pacman -S --needed base-devel mingw-w64-x86_64-toolchain

git & gitk:

pacman -S --needed git
pacman -S --needed mingw-w64-i686-tk

meld:

pacman -S --needed mingw-w64-i686-meld3

— Martin Burnicki martin.burnicki@burnicki.net, last updated 2022-08-11