How to manually add links to package binaries where link installation is broken

[infogulch]

Sometimes package installation doesn't add links when it should. For example, for me today, winget install BrechtSanders.WinLibs.POSIX.MSVCRT says that it added links with logs like this: Command line alias added: "gcc" but no links were present.

In lieu of an official fix (you should probably open a bug report), I wrote a powershell snippet that, for each executable in the current directory, creates a symbolic link to it in the winget links directory:

1. cd to the directory where the executables are located
2. execute this powershell snippet: ls *.exe | foreach { new-item -itemtype symboliclink -path "$env:localappdata\Microsoft\WinGet\Links\$(split-path "$_" -leaf)" -target "$_" }

[SpecterShell]

This package works by appending the mingw{32,64}\bin directory to the PATH and shouldn't add any link. The symbolic link on Windows is known to not work properly with the executables that are linked with DLL files in the same directory. The Command line alias added: "gcc" message doesn't necessarily mean it was adding links, but instead adding the parent directory to the PATH. If you can't use gcc or others after installation, please try restart your terminal or reboot first.

[infogulch]

I see, thank you.