https://github.com/exein-io/icedragon
Linux cross-compilation suite for building portable software
https://github.com/exein-io/icedragon
cross-compiler gentoo linux llvm musl musl-libc rust
Last synced: 3 months ago
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Linux cross-compilation suite for building portable software
- Host: GitHub
- URL: https://github.com/exein-io/icedragon
- Owner: exein-io
- License: apache-2.0
- Created: 2024-10-21T21:54:42.000Z (8 months ago)
- Default Branch: main
- Last Pushed: 2025-03-23T16:12:10.000Z (3 months ago)
- Last Synced: 2025-03-23T16:36:22.731Z (3 months ago)
- Topics: cross-compiler, gentoo, linux, llvm, musl, musl-libc, rust
- Language: Rust
- Homepage:
- Size: 97.7 KB
- Stars: 0
- Watchers: 2
- Forks: 1
- Open Issues: 1
-
Metadata Files:
- Readme: README.md
- License: LICENSE
Awesome Lists containing this project
README
# icedragon
Linux cross-compilation suite for building portable, statically linked
software.
Currently supports the following languages:
* C
* C++
* Rust
Icedragon consists of two parts:
* Container images, with a "zero-setup" set of toolchains and essential
libraries.
* CLI, which leverages the container images, but feels like using a regular
compiler on your host.
It's based on:
* [Gentoo] ([musl-llvm] flavor), which is used as the base system for the
containers.
* [crossdev], which manages [Gentoo] sysroots for different
architectures.
* [musl] libc, which, unlike [glibc], can be statically linked
without imposing any runtime dependencies.
* [LLVM] compiler infrastructure.
* [rustup], which is used for managing [Rust] toolchains.
## How is icedragon different from Alpine Linux?
Let's start with similarities. Both icedragon and [Alpine] are using
[musl] as the C standard library. Both can be used to build portable,
statically linked binaries.
The most important difference is that icedragon is not a Linux distribution.
It's just [Gentoo] with specific configuration, provided as ready to use
containers. All packaging-related work necessary for icedragon to work is done
upstream.
The second difference is that [Alpine] uses [GCC] and [GNU C++ library].
Icedragon uses [LLVM] and [LLVM C++ library] and doesn't come with [GCC].
The last difference is strong focus on cross-compilation in icedragon, which
provides sysroots and toolchains for foreign architectures out of the box. It
does so thanks to [crossdev], which allows management and installation of
packages inside sysroots. There is no such tooling on Alpine.
## Featured libraries
Icedragon comes with a set of static libraries which can be considered "build
essentials" for the most of C/C++ software on Linux, as well as for Rust
crates, which don't vendor C dependencies and expect them to be present in the
system.
* Compression libraries:
* brotli
* zstd
* zlib
* Cryptography libraries:
* gpgme
* OpenSSL
* JSON
* json-c
* Key-value stores
* rocksdb
* Linux-specific libraries and utilities:
* util-linux
* Network libraries:
* c-ares
* libcurl
* Regular expressions:
* libpcre2
## GNU extensions
musl aims to stay compatible with the [POSIX C standard] for the sake of
portability. [glibc], on the other hand, adds so called [GNU extensions] -
additional modules and functions which are not part of the standard. As a
result, software making use of GNU extensions doesn't build with musl.
However, there are projects which provide standalone, musl-compatible ports of
various GNU extensions:
* [argp-standalone]
* [error-standalone]
* [musl-fts]
They still don't provide 100% compatibility with glibc, but they are good enough
to make building of most [Gentoo] packages possible.
These ports can be linked statically and don't issue any `dlopen` calls.
A similar incompatibility exists between [compiler-rt] (the runtime library
provided by [LLVM], used in icedragon), and [libgcc] (a similar library
provided by [GCC]). [libgcc] comes with extensions, which are not included by
default in [compiler-rt]. It also exports symbols from [libunwind] ([GCC]'s
unwinder library).
LLVM community addressed that problem by creating [llvm-libgcc] subproject,
which:
* Builds a copy of [compiler-rt] with GNU extensions enabled.
* Uses [LLVM libunwind], which is compatible with GCC's unwinder library.
* Links them together, providing a drop-in replacement for [libgcc].
icedragon provides all the GNU extension ports mentioned above.
[Gentoo]: https://www.gentoo.org
[crossdev]: https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Crossdev
[musl]: https://musl.libc.org
[glibc]: https://www.gnu.org/software/libc
[LLVM]: https://llvm.org
[rustup]: https://rustup.rs
[Rust]: https://www.rust-lang.org
[Alpine]: https://www.alpinelinux.org
[GCC]: https://gcc.gnu.org
[GNU C++ library]: https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/libstdc++
[LLVM C++ library]: https://libcxx.llvm.org
[POSIX C library]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C_POSIX_library
[GNU extensions]: https://www.gnu.org/software/gnulib/manual/html_node/Glibc-Function-Substitutes.html
[argp-standalone]: https://github.com/ericonr/argp-standalone
[error-standalone]: https://hacktivis.me/git/error-standalone
[musl-fts]: https://github.com/void-linux/musl-fts
[libgcc]: https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gccint/Libgcc.html
[libunwind]: https://libunwind.nongnu.org/docs.html
[llvm-libgcc]: https://github.com/llvm/llvm-project/tree/main/llvm-libgcc
[LLVM libunwind]: https://github.com/llvm/llvm-project/tree/main/libunwind