Build with mingw-w64. MSVC hasn't been tested but that's what upstream python uses for PC builds.
It very important you build shared not static. This avoid some very annoying link errors when linking the executable.
Pass -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS:BOOL=ON when configuring the source if your cmake toolchain does not provide this option by default
If on Arch Linux there are some very nice tools in the AUR just for this.
- mingw-w64-cmake - CMake wrapper for MinGW
- mingw-w64-environment - Environment wrapper
- mingw-w64-pkg-config - pkg-config wrapper
Just ensure you use regular
cmake --build <out-of-tree-dir>when building.
Copy the built python dll next to the executable
Finally, copy the mingw librarires next to the executable (they are located in /usr/<i686 or x86_x64>/bin)
- libssp.dll
- libwinpthread.dll
- libgcc_s_dw2.dll(i686 32-bit) or libgcc_s_seh.dll (x86_x64 64-bit)
When running the executable on a fresh install of Windows 7 or earlier, you may be missing api-ms-core-path.dll. Installing Visual C++ and Windows Runtimes to fix this issue.
You may also consider copying one next to executable.