Updated status on the compilation of busybox on Mac OS X

Hello--

I've recently found a post on this mailing list dating back to 2007. The author of this post had found that busybox would build on Mac OS X up to the point where fakeroot would be required.

http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/buildroot/2007-February/002138.html

I've now downloaded and built fakeroot from "fakeroot_1.14.tar.gz." My build system was Mac OS X 10.5.8 with Darwin 9.8.0, using i686-apple-darwin9-gcc-4.0.1 (GCC) 4.0.1 (Apple Inc. build 5493). The source download location was:

http://ftp.debian.org/debian/pool/main/f/fakeroot/

However, I've found that the more recent versions of fakeroot (i.e. fakeroot_1.14.3.tar.gz) do not cleanly build on Mac OS X.

What is the updated status on Mac OS X support for buildroot?

Nicholas

Hi,

Nicholas> However, I've found that the more recent versions of fakeroot Nicholas> (i.e. fakeroot_1.14.3.tar.gz) do not cleanly build on Mac OS X.

Nicholas> What is the updated status on Mac OS X support for buildroot?

I haven't heard about anyone doing it, and as you see, the posting about it is almost 3 years old.

Why would you want to do it in the first place? Doing Linux development on !Linux systems is imho a recipe for pain.

Bye, Peter Korsgaard

Hi Peter--

Thank you so much for your response! I agree that Linux systems are much, much better than generic Unix, and I actually run buildroot for the AVR32 architecture on a very nice Ubuntu box. (No virtualization required.) However, there are a few programs that I would also like to use on Mac OS X, and imho it would be nice to do everything on the same operating system. I also have some hardware which is unfortunately not supported on Linux.

I have tried to compile buildroot on Mac OS X. Using some packages from the Fink project (i.e. binutils), I can coax buildroot to partially compile. However, the compilation seems to crash when it encounters uclibc.

I know that the Gumstix folks seem to keep a separate build for Mac OS X:

http://docwiki.gumstix.org/index.php/Buildroot_on_MacOSX

To me, it seemed a bit of a shame to keep a separate build, and it would be nice to perhaps merge this into the main distribution, at least imho to allow for buildroot to compile on all Linux and Unix systems. I suppose that my desire to do compilation on a Unix system is more for philosophical rather than for practical reasons.

Nicholas

Hi,

Nicholas> Thank you so much for your response! I agree that Linux Nicholas> systems are much, much better than generic Unix, and I Nicholas> actually run buildroot for the AVR32 architecture on a very Nicholas> nice Ubuntu box. (No virtualization required.) However, Nicholas> there are a few programs that I would also like to use on Mac Nicholas> OS X, and imho it would be nice to do everything on the same Nicholas> operating system. I also have some hardware which is Nicholas> unfortunately not supported on Linux.

OK. I still think you'll have an easier time doing your buildroot work on a (virtual) Linux box, but it's your choice..

Nicholas> I have tried to compile buildroot on Mac OS X. Using some Nicholas> packages from the Fink project (i.e. binutils), I can coax Nicholas> buildroot to partially compile. However, the compilation Nicholas> seems to crash when it encounters uclibc.

Nicholas> I know that the Gumstix folks seem to keep a separate build Nicholas> for Mac OS X:

Nicholas> http://docwiki.gumstix.org/index.php/Buildroot_on_MacOSX

Yes, the gumstix people unfortunately haven't been that good at submitting their fixes back to us :/

Nicholas> To me, it seemed a bit of a shame to keep a separate build, Nicholas> and it would be nice to perhaps merge this into the main Nicholas> distribution, at least imho to allow for buildroot to compile Nicholas> on all Linux and Unix systems. I suppose that my desire to Nicholas> do compilation on a Unix system is more for philosophical Nicholas> rather than for practical reasons.

I agree that there isn't any technical reason why BR shouldn't work on MacOSX, but currently there's no active developers using it (I do write this on a macbook, but I very rarely boot into macosx).

The problem isn't just getting the makefiles of BR to work on MacOSX, the biggest problem is all the build scripts of the individual packages.

With that said, patches to make stuff work better on MacOSX are welcome, as long as they aren't too ugly / add too much extra complexity for such a rarely used setup.

Bye, Peter Korsgaard

Of course, Linux is much easier at many things, which is the reason why it is used for projects such as Busybox.

That's always an issue with having a forked or separate build tree from the main project. IMHO, I don't like separate build trees, but apparently it is the sometimes the way that software development is accomplished.

Strangely enough, I'm also writing this on a macbook, and I boot more into Linux than any other of the three operating systems that I run. I won't mention the name of the third operating system, but I tend to use it only for engineering software that won't run on Linux. ;-)

Agreed.

This would be something to add to my to-do list. I know that making FOSS software run on a non-free OS is somewhat of a contradiction, but IMHO it helps to encourage adoption among a segment of users that exclusively use a setup such as Mac OS X. I believe that a good example of this type of adoption is Firefox, which runs on all of the "Big three" operating systems.
Besides, it might be kind of fun to ensure that buildroot can run on all flavours of GNU/Linux/Unix.

Nicholas

Le Sun, 29 Nov 2009 19:37:55 +0100,
Peter Korsgaard <[email protected]> a ?crit :

To be honest, for many years, the Buildroot project was mostly unmaintaned, so it was basically not possible for all these forks (Gumstix, OpenWRT, Armadeus, etc.) to submit their changes and get some proper review and integration.

Nowadays, the project is in a much better shape, and I think the situation would be different now that potential contributors see that the project is active, has an official maintainer, deliver regular releases, etc.

Sincerly,

Thomas

Thomas Petazzoni, Free Electrons
Kernel, drivers and embedded Linux development,
consulting, training and support.
http://free-electrons.com

After installing some basic utilities from the Fink project (i.e. binutils), as well as building and installing some additional software (i.e. fakeroot), I can coax buildroot into configuring (i.e. make defconfig), downloading the source code (i.e. make source), and partially building (make).

Buildroot crashes partially through the install. If I recall correctly, there is trouble with buildroot finding a directory, or difficulties building uclibc.

At this time, I don't remember the complete series of steps that I took, but I assume that if all of the GNU build dependencies are satisfied on the Mac OS X machine, then buildroot should run. However, this strongly depends on the user replacing the BSD utilities with Fink packages.

Here is where buildroot-2009.08 crashes:

Checking build system dependencies:

BUILDROOT_DL_DIR clean:                Ok
CC clean:                    Ok
CXX clean:                    Ok
CPP clean:                    Ok
CFLAGS clean:                    Ok
INCLUDES clean:                    Ok
CXXFLAGS clean:                    Ok
which installed:                Ok
sed works:                    Ok (/sw/bin/sed)

GNU make version '3.81': Ok
C compiler '/usr/bin/gcc'
C compiler version '4.0.1': Ok
C++ compiler '/usr/bin/g++'
C++ compiler version '4.0.1': Ok

awk installed:                    Ok
bash installed:                    Ok
bison installed:                Ok
flex installed:                    Ok
gettext installed:                Ok
makeinfo installed:                Ok
Build system dependencies:            Ok

rm -rf /Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/project_build_avr32/atngw100/buildroot-config mkdir -p /Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/project_build_avr32/atngw100
cp -dpRf package/config/buildroot-config /Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/project_build_avr32/atngw100/buildroot-config set -x && /usr/bin/make -j1 -C /Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/toolchain_build_avr32/uClibc-0.9.30-avr32-2.1.5 \

PREFIX=/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/toolchain_build_avr32/uClibc_dev/

\
        DEVEL_PREFIX=/usr/ \

RUNTIME_PREFIX=/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/toolchain_build_avr32/uClibc_dev/

\
        HOSTCC="/usr/bin/gcc" headers \
        install_headers

+ /usr/bin/make -j1 -C /Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/toolchain_build_avr32/uClibc-0.9.30-avr32-2.1.5 PREFIX=/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/toolchain_build_avr32/uClibc_dev/ DEVEL_PREFIX=/usr/ RUNTIME_PREFIX=/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/toolchain_build_avr32/uClibc_dev/ HOSTCC=/usr/bin/gcc headers install_headers
/bin/sh:
/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/build_avr32/staging_dir/usr/bin/avr32-linux-uclibc-gcc:
No such file or directory
make[1]:
/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/build_avr32/staging_dir/usr/bin/avr32-linux-uclibc-gcc:
Command not found
make[1]:
/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/build_avr32/staging_dir/usr/bin/avr32-linux-uclibc-gcc:
Command not found
HOSTCC extra/locale/gen_locale
extra/locale/gen_locale.c: In function 'do_locale_names':
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:238: warning: format '%d' expects type 'int',
but argument 3 has type 'long unsigned int'
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:242: warning: format '%d' expects type 'int',
but argument 3 has type 'long unsigned int'
extra/locale/gen_locale.c: In function 'do_lc_time':
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:954: error: 'ERA_YEAR' undeclared (first use
in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:954: error: (Each undeclared identifier is
reported only once
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:954: error: for each function it appears in.) extra/locale/gen_locale.c: In function 'lc_numeric_S':
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:986: error: 'GROUPING' undeclared (first use
in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c: In function 'do_lc_numeric':
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1056: error: 'GROUPING' undeclared (first use
in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1083:2: warning: #warning fix the char entries
for monetary... target signedness of char may be different!
extra/locale/gen_locale.c: In function 'lc_monetary_S':
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1114: error: 'MON_GROUPING' undeclared (first
use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c: In function 'do_lc_monetary':
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1184: error: 'INT_CURR_SYMBOL' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1185: error: 'CURRENCY_SYMBOL' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1186: error: 'MON_DECIMAL_POINT' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1187: error: 'MON_THOUSANDS_SEP' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1188: error: 'MON_GROUPING' undeclared (first
use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1189: error: 'POSITIVE_SIGN' undeclared (first
use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1190: error: 'NEGATIVE_SIGN' undeclared (first
use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1191: error: 'INT_FRAC_DIGITS' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1192: error: 'FRAC_DIGITS' undeclared (first
use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1193: error: 'P_CS_PRECEDES' undeclared (first
use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1194: error: 'P_SEP_BY_SPACE' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1195: error: 'N_CS_PRECEDES' undeclared (first
use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1196: error: 'N_SEP_BY_SPACE' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1197: error: 'P_SIGN_POSN' undeclared (first
use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1198: error: 'N_SIGN_POSN' undeclared (first
use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1199: error: 'INT_P_CS_PRECEDES' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1200: error: 'INT_P_SEP_BY_SPACE' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1201: error: 'INT_N_CS_PRECEDES' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1202: error: 'INT_N_SEP_BY_SPACE' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1203: error: 'INT_P_SIGN_POSN' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1204: error: 'INT_N_SIGN_POSN' undeclared
(first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c: In function 'do_lc_ctype':
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1322: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT0_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1323: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT1_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1324: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT2_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1325: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT3_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1326: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT4_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1327: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT5_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1328: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT6_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1329: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT7_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1330: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT8_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
extra/locale/gen_locale.c:1331: error: '_NL_CTYPE_OUTDIGIT9_MB'
undeclared (first use in this function)
make[1]: *** [extra/locale/gen_locale] Error 1
make: *** [/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot/buildroot-2009.08/toolchain_build_avr32/uClibc-0.9.30-avr32-2.1.5/.configured] Error 2

Hi,

Nicholas> Here is where buildroot-2009.08 crashes:

FYI, 2009.11 is out.

Nicholas> Command not found
Nicholas> HOSTCC extra/locale/gen_locale

Locales might be different on MacOSX - uclibc builds these using information from the host. You might have more luck by disabling locale support for now (BR2_ENABLE_LOCALE)

Bye, Peter Korsgaard

I just downloaded it. Once again, it's a really nice piece of work. Congratulations! - and thanks to you and the rest of the people who made this release of Buildroot a reality.

Peter - you are right about this. I modified the Buildroot .config to so that BR2_ENABLE_LOCALE=no, and the build process continues on Mac OS X. However, I then encountered another error. Apparently the gcc makefile believes that the host is Linux, so host-linux.c is being compiled instead of host-darwin.c.

Here's the output of the most recent error:

/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot-1/buildroot-2009.11/output/toolchain/gcc-4.2.2-avr32-1.1.3/gcc/config/host-linux.c:
In function 'linux_gt_pch_use_address':
/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot-1/buildroot-2009.11/output/toolchain/gcc-4.2.2-avr32-1.1.3/gcc/config/host-linux.c:194:
error: ?MAP_ANONYMOUS? undeclared (first use in this function) /Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot-1/buildroot-2009.11/output/toolchain/gcc-4.2.2-avr32-1.1.3/gcc/config/host-linux.c:194:
error: (Each undeclared identifier is reported only once /Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot-1/buildroot-2009.11/output/toolchain/gcc-4.2.2-avr32-1.1.3/gcc/config/host-linux.c:194:
error: for each function it appears in.)
make[2]: *** [host-linux.o] Error 1
make[2]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs....
make[1]: *** [all-gcc] Error 2
make: *** [/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot-1/buildroot-2009.11/output/toolchain/gcc-4.2.2-initial/.compiled] Error

In buildroot, how do I set the host system for the configuration of gcc? This is trivial for a command-line compile of gcc, but how would I do this within Buildroot, so that the appropriate options are passed to ./configure for gcc?

Perhaps changing this would allow for gcc to more properly compile.

BR2_EXTRA_GCC_CONFIG_OPTIONS?

-Austin

Thanks Austin - I tried this, and buildroot continued to compile without
the error. Here's what I added to the .config file:

BR2_EXTRA_GCC_CONFIG_OPTIONS="--host=i686-apple-darwin9 --build=i686-apple-darwin9"

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/buildroot/attachments/20091202/c850f75a/attachment.htm>

Nicholas> In buildroot, how do I set the host system for the configuration of Nicholas> gcc? This is trivial for a command-line compile of gcc, but how would Nicholas> I do this within Buildroot, so that the appropriate options are passed Nicholas> to ./configure for gcc?

Nicholas> Perhaps changing this would allow for gcc to more properly compile.

BR2_GNU_BUILD_SUFFIX (Build options->GNU build hostname suffix)

Bye, Peter Korsgaard

I've now added BR2_GNU_BUILD_SUFFIX="apple-darwin9" to the .config file.

Thanks, Peter. Compilation continues...

Hello--

I've now added these entries to the Buildroot .config file:

BR2_ENABLE_LOCALE=no BR2_BUILD_SUFFIX=apple-darwin9 BR2_EXTRA_GCC_CONFIG_OPTIONS="--host=i686-apple-darwin9 --build=i686-apple-darwin9"

Buildroot continues to build, but crashes with the following error. (My apologies for the odd characters in the error posting.) Apparently the compiler cannot find elf.h, which is required for compilation. This could prove to be a real show-stopper, since elf.h does not appear to be included with BSD-style systems.

lsmod.c:28:24: error: asm/unistd.h: No such file or directory
insmod.c:29:24: error: asm/unistd.h: No such file or directory
make[1]: *** [lsmod.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs....
modprobe.c:35:17: error: elf.h: No such file or directory
modprobe.c:38:24: error: asm/unistd.h: No such file or directory
make[1]: *** [insmod.o] Error 1
modprobe.c: In function ?get_section32?:
modprobe.c:437: error: ?Elf32_Ehdr? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:437: error: (Each undeclared identifier is reported only once modprobe.c:437: error: for each function it appears in.)
modprobe.c:437: error: ?hdr? undeclared (first use in this function)
modprobe.c:438: error: ?Elf32_Shdr? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:438: error: ?sechdrs? undeclared (first use in this function)
modprobe.c: In function ?get_section64?:
modprobe.c:464: error: ?Elf64_Ehdr? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:464: error: ?hdr? undeclared (first use in this function)
modprobe.c:465: error: ?Elf64_Shdr? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:465: error: ?sechdrs? undeclared (first use in this function)
modprobe.c: In function ?elf_ident?:
modprobe.c:491: error: ?EI_CLASS? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:491: error: ?ELFMAG? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:491: error: ?SELFMAG? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:492: error: ?ELFCLASSNONE? undeclared (first use in this
function)
modprobe.c: In function ?get_section?:
modprobe.c:502: error: ?ELFCLASS32? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:504: error: ?ELFCLASS64? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c: In function ?invalidate_section32?:
modprobe.c:536: error: ?Elf32_Ehdr? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:536: error: ?hdr? undeclared (first use in this function)
modprobe.c:537: error: ?Elf32_Shdr? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:537: error: ?sechdrs? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:543: error: ?SHF_ALLOC? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c: In function ?invalidate_section64?:
modprobe.c:548: error: ?Elf64_Ehdr? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:548: error: ?hdr? undeclared (first use in this function)
modprobe.c:549: error: ?Elf64_Shdr? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:549: error: ?sechdrs? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:555: error: ?SHF_ALLOC? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c: In function ?strip_section?:
modprobe.c:564: error: ?ELFCLASS32? undeclared (first use in this function) modprobe.c:567: error: ?ELFCLASS64? undeclared (first use in this function)
make[1]: *** [modprobe.o] Error 1
make: *** [/Users/nkinar/Desktop/buildroot-1/buildroot-2009.11/output/toolchain/module-init-tools-3.2.2/depmod] Error 2

Nicholas> Hello--
Nicholas> I've now added these entries to the Buildroot .config file:

Nicholas> BR2_ENABLE_LOCALE=no
Nicholas> BR2_BUILD_SUFFIX=apple-darwin9
Nicholas> BR2_EXTRA_GCC_CONFIG_OPTIONS="--host=i686-apple-darwin9 Nicholas> --build=i686-apple-darwin9"

BR2_BUILD_SUFFIX should be enough (it's used to set --host / --build).

Nicholas> lsmod.c:28:24: error: asm/unistd.h: No such file or directory Nicholas> insmod.c:29:24: error: asm/unistd.h: No such file or directory Nicholas> make[1]: *** [lsmod.o] Error 1
Nicholas> make[1]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs.... Nicholas> modprobe.c:35:17: error: elf.h: No such file or directory Nicholas> modprobe.c:38:24: error: asm/unistd.h: No such file or directory

That looks to me like a bug. It should look or headers in STAGING_DIR/usr/include and not on your host.

I don't normally use module-init-tools, but I'll take a look.

Bye, Peter Korsgaard

Thanks, Peter. This is greatly appreciated.

Nicholas

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/buildroot/attachments/20091203/9d2e0800/attachment.htm>