arm-linux crosscompiling on Debian Sid

Here’s a simple howto on how to install an ARM crosscompiling environment on your Debian Unstable:

1. Install crosscompiler packages from web.archive.org¹
2. Create a virtual deb package extraction directory:
   1. Create the directory /usr/arm-deb
   2. Create the directory /usr/arm-deb/usr
   3. Create the following symlinks in /usr/arm-deb/usr:
      1. ln -s /usr/arm/bin /usr/arm-deb/usr/bin
      2. ln -s /usr/arm/lib /usr/arm-deb/usr/lib
      3. ln -s /usr/arm/include /usr/arm-deb/usr/include
      4. ln -s /usr/arm/share /usr/arm-deb/usr/share

This will allow easy package extraction.

Now, download the packages you need manually (from www.debian.org and extract them in the directory using dpkg -x <package file> /usr/arm-deb

To compile something, you first have to add /usr/arm/bin to your path (export PATH=/usr/arm/bin:$PATH), set include paths to those include files (export CPPFLAGS="-I/usr/arm/include") and add -host=arm-linux to your ./configure.

Happy compiling ;)

1. Internet Archive snapshot. Original URL: http://debian.speedblue.org/  ↩︎