scenario: next week, i'm teaching an embedded linux course using the
beaglebone black as a test vehicle, so i'm trying to enumerate all the
possible S/W tools i might use for that class, just for the sake of
variety.
for the sake of cross-compiling u-boot, the kernel and the rootfs,
what are the best choices in ARM toolchain that people would
recommend?
for now, i'm going to have the following available:
* based on robert nelson's eewiki.net page, i'll have linaro's
gcc-linaro-arm-linux-gnueabihf-4.9-2014.09_linux.tar.xz
* i'll also have linaro's much newer
gcc-linaro-5.1-2015.08-x86_64_arm-linux-gnueabihf.tar.xz, which i
admit i haven't tested as much
* finally, i'll have the toolchain built by the yocto project:
poky-glibc-x86_64-meta-toolchain-cortexa8hf-vfp-neon-toolchain-2.0.sh
that should be more than enough, but is there anything else i can
throw into the mix, just for completeness?
rday
that should be more than enough, but is there anything else i can
throw into the mix, just for completeness?
Ubuntu 14.04 comes out of the box, or rather has APT packages for cross toolchains that “just work”. If you need an example of what I’m talking about, check out Professor Molloy’s youtube videos on the subject.
Anyway, this is a method for “no fuss” setup. You simply apt-get install <x.y.z> Granted, I’ve never used these toolchains to build uboot, or the kernel.
There is also gasp crosstool-ng, which may be worth mentioning, in passing. e.g. the option to build ones own toolchain.
Ubuntu 14.04 comes out of the box, or rather has APT packages for
cross toolchains that "just work". If you need an example of what
I'm talking about, check out Professor Molloy's youtube videos on
the subject.
i'll mention those, the class is based on fedora but making them
aware of working ubuntu packages is never a bad thing.
There is also *gasp* crosstool-ng, which may be worth mentioning, in
passing. e.g. the option to build ones own toolchain.
i always mention crosstool-ng, but i typically don't recommend going
down that road unless they have a *specific* need. there are enough
out-of-the-box toolchains that should already work.
rday
Just an additional thought . . . Personally, I rather like the idea of Linaro’s toolchain. It makes it really simple for a regular user to setup, use, and compile stuff without having to actually having to install anything into / onto the system.
that's almost certainly what i'm going to use as my primary
toolchain in class next week ... i'm mostly following along RCN's BBB
eewiki page here:
https://eewiki.net/display/linuxonarm/BeagleBone+Black
and he refers to the linaro toolchain:
https://releases.linaro.org/14.09/components/toolchain/binaries/gcc-linaro-arm-linux-gnueabihf-4.9-2014.09_linux.tar.xz
and other than experimenting with whether any of the components listed
there could be upgraded, that page looks pretty battle-tested so i
most likely won't mess with it.
well, not much ...
rday