How to compile executable for Windows with GCC with Linux Subsystem?

Question

Windows 10 Anniversary Update includes the Linux Subsystem for Ubuntu. I installed gcc with sudo apt-get install gcc.

I wrote some simple C code for tes

Answer 1

If you compile using gcc on linux it will produce an ELF file not a PE (what windows understand) file

To compile a program for windows inside linux you can use mingw.

Answer 2

Linux Subsystem works as a Linux-computer. You can only run Linux executables inside it and default gcc creates Linux executables.

To create Windows executables, you need to install mingw cross-compiler:

sudo apt-get install mingw-w64

Then you can create 32-bit Windows executable with:

i686-w64-mingw32-gcc -o main32.exe main.c

And 64-bit Windows executable with:

x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc -o main64.exe main.c

Note that these Windows executables will not work inside Linux Subsystem, only outside of it.