Rust not compiling project - exit code 1

[ThomasA]

Hi, I'm unable to compile a Rust project on windows because of this error:

error: linking with `x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc` failed: exit code: 1
  |
  = note: (omitted, very long)
  = note: ld: cannot find -lshlwapi: No such file or directory

I have installed Rust using the x86_64-pc-windows-gnu version, and a hello world cargo project compiles file.
Thanks for any help!

[nerditation]

shlwapi is a Windows system library. the rust toolchain only ships minimal mingw32/64 libraries required to build rust code. apparently certain crate in your project dependencies requires additional foreign libraries to link. the library is included in standard mingw32/64 installation though, you can install mingw32/64. alternatively, you can install msvc and switch to the -msvc abi rust toolchain.

ps: I think the gnu linker (and rust-lld too) does support link against .lib files, but you still need to install the WindowsKit SDK from microsoft to get the library files.

[Vladimir]

It seems shlwapi does not require WindowsKit SDK. I have only MinGW installed and I have this library at MinGW\x86_64-w64-mingw32\lib\libshlwapi.a. So, installing only MinGW should be sufficient.

[nerditation]

yes, as I said, shlwapi is included in standard mingw64 installation.

I mentioned the WindowsKit SDK as a side note about linking against *.lib files using the gnu linker, for example, if I add a build script with println!("cargo:rustc-link-search=C:/Program Files (x86)/Windows Kits/10/Lib/10.0.22000.0/um/x64"), I can link against all the WindowsKit *.lib files just fine using the gnu abi toolchain.

actually, the gnu linker can link against "normal" *.dll files directly, normal meaning the dll doesn't do weird stuff like loader forwarding or exporting only using cardinals etc.