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[QEMU] Build a toolchain for ARM.md

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[QEMU] Build a toolchain for ARM.md

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We use a crosstool-NG script to build a toolchain.

You will need a working native toolchain and build tools on your host PC. To work with crosstool-NG on an Ubuntu host, you will need to install the packages using the following command (if you uses docker, skip this):

sudo apt install automake bison chrpath flex g++ git gperf gawk libexpat1-dev libncurses5-dev libsdl1.2-dev libtool python2.7-dev texinfo bc qemu-system-arm qemu cpio u-boot-tools

Note: My PC is running ubuntu 20.04

Get the crosstool-NG

git clone https://github.com/crosstool-ng/crosstool-ng.git

Create the front-end menu system for crosstool-NG

cd crosstool-ng
./bootstrap
$ ./configure --enable-local
$ make

You will have the ct-ng execute file.

Check which toolchain is supported

./ct-ng list-samples You will get something as follows. Find your needed toolchain and build it.

Status  Sample name
[L...]   aarch64-ol7u9-linux-gnu
[L...]   aarch64-rpi3-linux-gnu
[L...]   aarch64-rpi4-linux-gnu
[L..X]   aarch64-unknown-linux-android
[L...]   aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu
[L...]   aarch64-unknown-linux-uclibc
[L...]   alphaev56-unknown-linux-gnu
[L...]   alphaev67-unknown-linux-gnu
[L...]   arc-arc700-linux-uclibc
[L...]   arc-archs-linux-gnu
[L...]   arc-multilib-elf32
[L...]   arc-multilib-linux-gnu

In this tutorial, I will build a toolchain for ARM CPU architecture. It is arm-unknown-linux-gnueabi

You can take a look the details this toolchain by command: ./ct-ng show-arm-unknown-linux-gnueabi

Build toolchain for the target

Generate the configuratio for arm-unknown-linux-gnueabi

./ct-ng arm-unknown-linux-gnueabi

After this step, there is a .config file in the same directory which is configured for arm-unknown-linux-gnueabi

At this point, you can review the configuration and make changes using the configuration by menuconfig or edit .config file:

  ./ct-ng menuconfig
  or
  vi .config

In this, I will edit .config file.

  • Use linux v4.10.17
  • Disable all debug option in crosstool

by changing the below CONFIG option:

# CT_LINUX_V_5_2 is not set
CT_LINUX_V_4_10=y
...
CT_LINUX_VERSION="4.10.17"
...
# CT_DEBUG_DUMA is not set
# CT_DEBUG_GDB is not set
# CT_DEBUG_LTRACE is not set
# CT_DEBUG_STRACE is not set

Then save and start building

Build

./ct-ng build

You will see some logs as below:

...
[INFO ]  Installing final gcc compiler: done in 1272.69s (at 50:42)
[INFO ]  =================================================================
[INFO ]  Finalizing the toolchain's directory
[INFO ]    Stripping all toolchain executables
[EXTRA]    Installing the populate helper
[EXTRA]    Installing a cross-ldd helper
[EXTRA]    Creating toolchain aliases
[EXTRA]    Collect license information from: /home/dcthinh/learn/crosstool-ng/.build/arm-unknown-linux-gnueabi/src
[EXTRA]    Put the license information to: /home/dcthinh/x-tools/arm-unknown-linux-gnueabi/share/licenses
[INFO ]  Finalizing the toolchain's directory: done in 8.68s (at 50:51)
[INFO ]  Build completed at 20220304.210625
[INFO ]  (elapsed: 50:49.87)
[INFO ]  Finishing installation (may take a few seconds)...
...

The build will take about half an hour, after which you will find your toolchain is present in ~/x-tools/

For example:

ls -l x-tools/
...
drwxrwxr-x 8 dcthinh dcthinh 4096 Thg 3   1 21:29 aarch64-rpi3-linux-gnu
drwxrwxr-x 8 dcthinh dcthinh 4096 Thg 3   1 18:34 aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu
dr-xr-xr-x 8 dcthinh dcthinh 4096 Thg 3   4 21:06 arm-unknown-linux-gnueabi

arm-unknown-linux-gnueabi is the cross compiler for our board target.

At this point, we already have a cross compiler which can be used for compile u-boot, linux, dtb for the target board. I will share it in the next posts.

References:

  • Mastering embedded linux programming