This is amazing.

At $workplace, we have a script that extracts a toolchain from a GitHub actions windows runner, packages it up, stuffs it into git LFS, which is then pulled by bazel as C++ toolchain.

This is the more scalable way, and I assume it could still somewhat easily be integrated into a bazel build.

This is harder than what I do. Just install LTSC Visual Studio build tools from [1], then chuck this in a cmd file:

    cl yourprogram.c /link user32.lib advapi32.lib ... etc etc ...

I've built a load of utilities that do that just fine. I use vim as an editor.

The Visual Studio toolchain does have LTSC and stable releases - no one seems to know about them though. see: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-gb/visualstudio/releases/2022... - you should use these if you are not a single developer and have to collaborate with people. Back like in the old days when we had pinned versions of the toolchain across whole company.

[1] https://download.visualstudio.microsoft.com/download/pr/5d23...

This is a serious quality of life improvement for people forced to deal with Windows! Great job.

And here I was messing with MingW64…

This is fantastic and someone at Microslop should take notes.

It starts by not looking into Windows through UNIX developer glasses.

The only issue currently plaguing Windows development is the mess with WinUI and WinAppSDK since Project Reunion, however they are relatively easy to ignore.

next, wrap it with wine and eventually share a bottle/winetrick