MinGW, a contraction of "Minimalist GNU for Windows", is a port of the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC), and GNU Binutils, for use in the development of native Microsoft Windows applications. Offered in easily installed binary package format, for native deployment on MS-Windows, or user-built from source, for cross-hosted use on Unix or GNU/Linux, the suite exploits Microsoft's standard system DLLs to provide the C-Runtime and Windows API.