The distutils, distributed with python 2.3, try to recognize the language (c or c++) and set the linker executable as appropriate. With cygwin and mingw32, the resulting linker is 'cc.exe', because the CygwinCompiler class fails to provide a definition for compiler_cxx. A solution is to patch the call to self.set_executables: # Hard-code GCC because that's what this is all about. # XXX optimization, warnings etc. should be customizable. self.set_executables(compiler='gcc -mcygwin -O -Wall', compiler_so='gcc -mcygwin -mdll -O -Wall', compiler_cxx='g++ -mcygwin -O -Wall', <========== linker_exe='gcc -mcygwin', linker_so=('%s -mcygwin %s' % (self.linker_dll, shared_option))) Regards, René Hogendoorn -- HITT Traffic Oude Apeldoornseweg 41-45 P.O. Box 717 NL-7300 AS, APELDOORN The Netherlands Telephone +31-55-543 2559 Mobile +31-610 925 412 Fax +31-55-543 2553 E-mail r.hogendoorn@hitt.nl