Using MinGW and POSIX tools is trying to force a square Linux peg through a round Windows hole. You can try and force it if you want.

If you started with a native Windows-only project you would never use MinGW. Probably 0.01% of Windows projects use GCC.

Over the years I have come to associate “project uses MinGW” with “this probably take two days of my life to get running and I’m just going to hit hurdle after hurdle after hurdle”.

The whole Linux concept of a “dev environment” is kind of really bad and broken and is why everyone uses Docker or Linux or one of a dozen different mutually incompatible environments.

The actually correct thing to do is for projects to include their fucking dependencies so they JustWork without jumping through all these hoops.