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This project aims to provide docker containers for different architectures that are commonly found in embedded devices. The base OS is based on Debian Linux and uses QEMU user mode as well as binfmt to automatically run foreign binaries "natively" on x86 systems.

Why do this?

Running QEMU against foreign libraries involves lots of awful hacks to get executables to run and link properly at runtime. Dockers are a great way to make things more portable and provide a smoother experience when it comes to cross-compiling tools for different architectures. It is much slower than using a native cross-compilation toolchain, however, it provides a quick and dirty way to get started with cross-compiling tools for embedded devices.

Finally, this project is just the beginning of a much larger project which is yet to be announced!

Usage

Build a Container

The build.sh script is designed to let you build Linux containers targeting different architectures and debian versions and variants. The root filesystem is built using the debootstrap script with an instance of qemu-<arch>-static copied into /usr/bin of the container's filesystem. This allows foreign binaries to run "natively". Here's an example of how you would build a container running debian buster with the minimal base variant for armel processors.

$ ./build.sh armel buster minbase

The arguments for build.sh are as follows:

usage: ./build.sh <cpu architecture> [debian version] [debian variant]

Where:

  • <cpu architecture> is one of the following entries from the debian supported architectures wiki page.
  • [debian version] (optional, default=buster) is the version of Debian you want to run.
  • [debian variant] (option, default=minbase) is the variant of Debian you want to bootstrap. As of this writing, minbase and buildd are supported.

The acceptable values for Debian version and variant can be found from the Debian release page and debootstrap manpage, respectively, for future releases. However, fakechroot should be avoided for the variant as it is not supported.

Running a Container

The ./run.sh script can be used to run containers you've built. Here's an example of how you would run a container built for the armel architecture with the minbase variant:

$ ./run.sh armel buster minbase

The arguments are exactly the same as the build.sh script, however, the version and variant parameters are required:

usage: ./build.sh <cpu architecture> <debian version> <debian variant>

Docker containers are built with /bin/bash as the entrypoint by default. If you are using docker run to run your containers, you will have to map the corresponding qemu-*-static binary to the container's /usr/bin path in order for the container to work.

Credit

Credit goes to @nachoparker for documenting this really neat technique as part of a three-part series: