gcc Cross-Compiler How-to

Posted 28 Aug 2003 at 19:28 UTC by steve

The GNU gcc compiler and the associated tool chain have been used by just about everyone that works on computers at one time or another. gcc supports a multitude of platforms from the smallest hc11 to the largest mainframe. But it can be tricky to build cross-compilers, which is what most robot builders need. Dan Kegel has put together an updated list of links and tools that will make building cross-compilers easier. Like all GNU tools, gcc is Free Software licensed under the GNU GPL.

Yeah but...., posted 28 Aug 2003 at 20:41 UTC by earlwb » (Master)

That works for the PowerPC CPU's but what about us nobodies who use those little Atmel AVR chips and such? I spent a couple of weeks off and on trying to no avail.

Speak of the devil..., posted 28 Aug 2003 at 20:56 UTC by earlwb » (Master)

Well, I spoke a little too soon, they now have WinAVR GNUCC for Windows based machines. Makes it really simple, just run the install program and your pretty much done. Then ensure your environment variable is set to the correct folder, and the Makefiles work then. You can get it via the www.avrfreaks.net website.

But like usual still takes a month or more to get it to work for Linux. If your lucky.

gcc AVR cross compiler, posted 28 Aug 2003 at 21:03 UTC by steve » (Master)

I built a gcc Linux to AVR cross-compiler for the computer at the DPRG warehouse recently. It wasn't too bad and I used a lot of the same scripts Kegel has now improved. The scripts were designed to help build cross compilers for any platform, they'd just gotten quite out of date. What Kegel did was update them to work with recent versions of the tool chain. He only tested a couple of platforms like the PowerPC but his fixes should make builds for any target a bit easier than they were.

I think that is the catch though..., posted 28 Aug 2003 at 22:07 UTC by earlwb » (Master)

Your like a big time expert on this though.

"Scripts" is plural, that means you need to find and edit a number of scripts and then run them to get it to work. Miss one thing, one directory or file permission seting and blooyie, it doesn't work. I remember having to go and run CHMOD all over the place trying to get it to work, it still didn't for me. I think I missed something more obscure though. I suppose if I stick to it I might get it eventually.

Windows had it down to running one really big EXE and it did it all for you.

Of course I remember how much trouble it took to get Oracle to run on my Linux box, I think I spent about a week messing with that. Finally got all the directory and folder permissions set ( I think I had to manually create all the directories before I installed it), and then it installed and ran OK. I must have gave up too soon on AVR GNUCC.

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