[Numpy-discussion] Moving to gcc 4.* for win32 installers ?

[David Cournapeau]

On Thu, Oct 27, 2011 at 2:16 PM, Peter
<numpy-discussion at maubp.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 27, 2011 at 2:02 PM, David Cournapeau <cournape at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I was wondering if we could finally move to a more recent version of
>> compilers for official win32 installers. This would of course concern
>> the next release cycle, not the ones where beta/rc are already in
>> progress.
>>
>> Basically, the pros:
>>  - we will have to move at some point
>>  - gcc 4.* seem less buggy, especially C++ and fortran.
>>  - no need to maintain msvcr90 vodoo
>> The cons:
>>  - it will most likely break the ABI
>>  - we need to recompile atlas (but I can take care of it)
>>  - the biggest: it is difficult to combine gfortran with visual
>> studio (more exactly you cannot link gfortran runtime to a visual
>> studio executable). The only solution I could think of would be to
>> recompile the gfortran runtime with Visual Studio, which for some
>> reason does not sound very appealing :)
>>
>> Thoughts ?
>
> Does this make any difference for producing 64bit Windows
> installers?

I have not tried in a long time to compile numpy/scipy with mingw 64
bits, but being able to use the same gcc line on 32 bits (4.*, 3.*
does not support 64 bits) should not hurt.

cheers,

David