Updating Mingw (gcc/g++) for Qt Creator (Windows)

UPDATE (6/24/12): I’ve updated instruction on how to get Qt working also, Please use that article here, if you’d like full functionality.

 

I wanted to play with c++11 features while using Qt Creator as my IDE. Here are the steps:

1.) download “mingw32-gcc-4.6.2-release-c,c++,fortran-sjlj-FINAL.zip” from http://code.google.com/p/mingw-builds/downloads/list (They recommend the latest with the FINAL keyword at the end).

2.) Make a copy of C:\QtSDK\mingw just incase something didn’t go right or you have to revert to it in the future.

3.) Extract the zip to C:\QtSDK\mingw

4.) Launching the qt mingw command prompt and running g++ –version should now show the version you downloaded and extracted:

C:\>g++ --version
g++ (niXman build) 4.6.2
Copyright (C) 2011 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.  There is NO
warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

5.) Compiled this test code below to see if c++11 features were working:

g++ -std=gnu++0x test.cpp && a.exe

#include <iostream>
#include <vector>
#include <memory>

/* Delgating constructors isn't implemented in gcc 4.6! */
/*
class Multiply
{
int m_var;
int m_mult;
public:
Multiply(int var, int mult)
{
m_var = var;
m_mult = mult;
}
Multiply(int mult) : Multiply(mult, mult)
{
}
int calc() const
{
return m_var * m_mult;
}
};
*/
struct Test
{
int a;
int b;
std::string c;
};

void printTest(Test t)
{
std::cout << t.a << "\t" << t.b << "\t" << t.c << std::endl;
}

std::string* createNewString()
{
return new std::string(u8"Hello World! Unicode Character: \u2018");
}

int main(int argc, char** argv)
{
std::vector<int> test = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};
for (auto& x : test)
std::cout << x << std::endl;
printTest({test.at(3),2,"Hello World!"});
std::shared_ptr<std::string> test_str(createNewString(), [](std::string* ptr) { delete ptr; });
std::cout << test_str << ":\t" << *test_str << std::endl;
return 0;
}

output:

1
2
3
4
5
4    2    Hello World!
0x581458:    Hello World! Unicode Character: ‘

The Qt SDK should probably be recompiled when using a different compiler version, I can’t make any guarantees this will work 100% but should be enough to play with c++11!