Ubuntu Wiki

• we have a qemu-static-arm binary that allows you to build arm binaries
  • on a x86 box; this is done in a chroot having the qemu-static binary; kernel does magic and uses binfmt to wrap armel binaries
• idea: use this approach to support even more environments:
  • candidates: mips, powerpc, m68k; basically all archs

    • cell architecture -> playstation

• idea: build single binary that supports all archs
  • does binfmt support that? ogra says: feels hard; loic thought yes, but
    • confirmed that it doesnt work.
• no options to not use the static binaries: we want to use it in chroot
  • without copying loads of libraries to the chroot
  • but this feels heavy weight

• ogra: we do not want to use full emulation -> must keep using the syscall emulation

• loic: wants to use the shared qemu builds, by copying libs to the appropriate
  • multiarch directory (e.g. /usr/lib/i486-linux-gnu)
• qemu-arch-static
• does multiarch help that llows to build a foreign system?
  • install qemu emulation and x86 binary in your chroot

Actions:

• investigate whether one can build a single binaries that supports all archs

  • -> loic found that this does not work

• loic to document non static approach

  • -> done, see /Research

• ogra to document -static approach and prepare patches -> send to

• propose -static patches to upstream debootstrap side by side with the idea
  • of loic being documented as a backup/clean/longterm plan.
  • in case we want -static for users that do not have a chroot, we can
    • probably keep it as it does not buy us maintaining a diff against debian debootstrap.