Re: info '(latex2e)\indent & \noindent' doesn't work with Msys2

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Gavin Smith <gavinsmith0123@gmail.com>
> Date: Tue, 4 Apr 2023 13:56:23 +0100
> Cc: arash@gnu.org, bug-texinfo@gnu.org
> 
> Ok, so assuming that this is all correct, we know that it is possible
> to build Texinfo for MSYS2 because it was done officially, and Arash
> had the official MSYS2 info program installed.
> 
> https://packages.msys2.org/base/texinfo
> 
> There must be some difference in the way it was built.

MSYS2 doesn't provide a native MinGW build of Texinfo.  They provide
only an MSYS2 build, which is basically the Unix code without all the
adaptations we have to the native Windows environment and
idiosyncrasies.

OTOH, I do use MSYS to build my MinGW ports of Texinfo (which can be
downloaded from the ezwinports site), so yes, MSYS _can_ be used to
build the native MinGW port of Texinfo, and that port then works well
for me in my day-to-day work on Windows.

> Or am I getting confused here between an MSYS2 Texinfo and a Texinfo built
> with MSYS2 (which would be a MinGW Texinfo)?  Are these two different
> things?

Yes, they are different.  See above.

MSYS is actually a fork of Cygwin with a few specialized changes
intended to allow invocation of native Windows programs.  Other than
that, MSYS programs are Cygwin programs: they issue Posix syscalls,
which are then converted to Windows by a special DLL on which all MSYS
programs depend.  That DLL is not used in native MinGW programs, which
instead use the stock Windows C runtime library.

> > The problem (at least the problem with Info showing Unicode quotes) is
> > not during the build, it's when Arash runs the Info he produced.  That
> > should work first and foremost on the Command Prompt window, which is
> > the native Windows terminal emulator.  Whether it also works inside
> > mintty, I don't know, but that could be a separate problem, and
> > making it work would be a bonus, because the MinGW build of Info
> > supports the Command Prompt as its main terminal.
> 
> Would this Info be expected to behave the same way as the Info program
> provided by the MSYS2 project?

No, see above: they are different ports.  In particular, MSYS2
programs support UTF-8 whereas native MinGW programs don't, at least
not easily.