Chapter 1. Cygwin Overview

Table of Contents
What is it?
Are the Cygwin tools free software?
A brief history of the Cygwin project
Expectations for UNIX Programmers
Expectations for Windows Programmers
Highlights of Cygwin Functionality

What is it?

The Cygwin tools are ports of the popular GNU development tools and utilities for Windows NT and 9x. They function through the use of the Cygwin library which provides the UNIX system calls and environment that these programs require.

With the tools installed, programmers may write Win32 console or GUI applications that make use of the standard Microsoft Win32 API and/or the Cygwin API. As a result, it is possible to easily port many significant UNIX programs without the need for extensive changes to the source code. This includes configuring and building most of the available GNU software (including the development tools included with the Cygwin distributions). Even if the compiler tools are of little to no use to you, you may have interest in the many standard UNIX utilities. They can be used both from the bash shell (provided) or from the command.com.