The kernel build-depends on binutils-dev becuase it needs libiberty.a from that package to build perf. This tools stuff has been moved out of the main debian kernel build and Ubuntu are just doing the same thing (which is good as it simplifies buil-deps greatly), but this doesn't change the main issue.
libiberty is used to support c++ symbol demangling in perf. It is an optional feature of the build, but no doubt useful to have and is enabled by default on linaro ubuntu kernels. To cross-build the kernel tools (basically perf) I believe we need binutils-dev:<HOST_ARCH> because we just need a static library to link into perf which will run on the HOST_ARCH machine the kernel is built for. i.e we don't need binutils-dev-<triplet> (which I had originally assumed would be the case). (someone correct me if I am wrong about this) Now binutils-dev is not currenly multiarch, but is just libs and headers so can easily be made so. However it depends on binutils, which cannot be an MA:same package as it's full of arch-specific binaries. (assembler, linker. etc). However it also contins two libraries /usr/lib/libbfd-2.23.1-system.so /usr/lib/libopcodes-2.23.1-system.so which are also symlink-to by binutils-dev (hence the dependency - there may be more reasons). So currently we have a binutils-dev:<HOST> but we can't install it because the host and build binutils packages would both be needed and would clash. So. what is the correct way to arrange things so that things can build-dep on the static libs in binutils-dev? There are several of them - I don't know which packages use the others: /usr/lib/libiberty.a /usr/lib/libopcodes.a /usr/lib/libiberty_pic.a /usr/lib/libbfd.a Is the right thing to do to split binutils and binutils-lib so binutils-dev is as-is, binutils-lib contains co-installable libraries (bfd*.so, opcodes*.so, what about all the linker scripts? )and binutils keeps the binaries and docs. An alternative would be to leave binutils and split out binutils-dev-static for cross-use (as I understand there is policy to only use the static versions of therse libs) Can someone who understands how this works comment? It's a bit confusing because we are normally used to thinking about cross-binutils and its collection of the same stuff built for the BUILD arch but targetting the HOST arch. So far as I can tell those are not relevant in this case, and nor can they be used instead. BUt clearly binutils is not quite your 'normal library, library-dev' package. Wookey -- Principal hats: Linaro, Emdebian, Wookware, Balloonboard, ARM http://wookware.org/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-embedded-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/20130124115026.gb5...@stoneboat.aleph1.co.uk
