MinGW UWP Demo

This is a demo of UWP apps (CoreApplication) on MinGW.

Why

To stress test the new C++/WinRT MinGW support mostly, also it is fun.

Build

To build this, you'll need the following:

• CMake
• C++/WinRT cppwinrt in $PATH
• A MinGW toolchain, LLVM/Clang 15 and GCC 12 from MSYS2 are tested. llvm-mingw is also tested.

The best way to get a working toolchain is install the following in MSYS2:

# CLANG64 Subsystem, with LLVM/Clang
pacman -S mingw-w64-clang-x86_64-{toolchain,cppwinrt,cmake,ninja}

# UCRT64 Subsystem, with GCC
pacman -S mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-{toolchain,cppwinrt,cmake,ninja}

With these, just build using CMake:

cd src/build
cmake ..
cmake --build .

Deploy

Manual deploy is required for now, you can use the Add-AppxPackage PowerShell cmdlet for this.

If you are currently in MSYS2 bash, you can deploy and run the app with:

powershell.exe -Command Add-AppxPackage -Register ./AppxManifest.xml
explorer.exe '/e,shell:appsfolder\CoreAppMinGW_706gaab1xw0ht!App'

It is tested to be working on recent enough OS versions on Xbox and IoT Core, for Mobile some hacks might be needed, aside from a working toolchain for 32-bit ARM.

Packaging

You can create an Appx with the appx target:

cmake --build . -t appx

makemsix from msix-packaging is required in $PATH.

The package is not signed by default.

Signing the package requires osslsigncode version 2.9 or higher due to a bug in msix/appx handling.

Alternatively, you can use MakeAppx.exe and SignTool.exe from Windows SDK.

What works

• XAML layout (load in runtime only)
• IValueConverter (initialized in code-behind)
• Data binding with ICustomPropertyProvider (see MainWindowViewModel.cpp and Property.hpp on how to implement this, it sucks but eh)
• ICommand
• Setting events from code-behind

What doesn't

• Compiled XAML and x:Bind
• Automatically generated control references via x:Name (so you'll need to crawl through the logical tree to get to your controls)
• Anything else? Feel free to hack around