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bmatzelle
gow
NSIS2011–2016
bmatzelle / gow

gow

Unix command line utilities installer for Windows.

20Distinct people
22Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
6.6KGitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

Unix command line utilities installer for Windows.

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use was verified in the last source check.

What people are saying

No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

No other repository is repeatedly linked in the same discussions.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 8–Nov 15 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/15/2026, 11:19:25 AM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by year22 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2011-11-23 13:24:19 UTC to 2016-11-18 15:39:47 UTC.

02462011-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 3 mentions; 2 submissions, 1 comments20112012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 7 mentions; 2 submissions, 5 comments2013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 3 mentions; 1 submissions, 2 comments20132014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 3 mentions; 1 submissions, 2 comments2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 5 mentions; 1 submissions, 4 comments2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2016

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
20112011-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC321
20122012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC725
20132013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC312
20142014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC312
20152015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC514
20162016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101

From the project README

An excerpt from the repository, fetched Nov 13, 2026.

Read the project’s introduction
Gow - The lightweight alternative to Cygwin Download | Home Page | FAQ Author: Brent R. Matzelle ABOUT Gow (Gnu On Windows) is the lightweight alternative to Cygwin. It uses a convenient Windows installer that installs about 130 extremely useful open source UNIX applications compiled as native win32 binaries. It is designed to be as small as possible, about 10 MB, as opposed to Cygwin which can run well over 100 MB depending upon options. Here are a couple quotes from happy Gow users: "Gow is one of the few things that makes Windows bearable/usable" "I use Gow constantly. It's awesome." "I just wanted to let you know that the GOW Suite is simply great - it is far lighter than the Cygwin tool, and is extremely useful. " FEATURES & BENEFITS Ultra light: Small, light subset (about 10 MB) of very useful UNIX binaries that do not have decent installers. Shell window from any directory: Adds a Windows Explorer shell window so that you can right-click on any directory and open a command (cmd.exe) window from that directory. Simple install/remove: Easy to install and remove, all files contained in a single directory in a standard C:\Program Files path. Included in PATH: All binaries are conveniently installed into the Windows PATH so they are accessible from a command-line window. Stable binaries: All commands are kept up to date but also as stable as possible. OTHER LINKS Release Notes Contributing Executables list Unix command reference FEEDBACK Please submit feedback via the Gow issue tracker Thank you for trying Gow! Copyright (c) 2006 - 2014 Brent R. Matzelle
Read the full README on GitHub

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