Compilation

Since the majority of PeachCloud is written in the Rust programming language, a compiler and associated toolchain(s) is required to build the software from source. Visit the rustup website to download the Rust toolchain installer. In addition to the default stable installation of Rust, many PeachCloud crates require the nightly toolchain channel in order to compile. Instructions for installing and updating toolchains can be found in the README of the rustup GitHub repo.

Cross-Compilation

While PeachCloud crates can be compiled directly on the Raspberry Pi or equivalent single board computer, this process is resource intensive and relatively slow - especially when compiling release builds. Cross-compilation is an effective means of leveraging greater compute resources to reduce compilation time.

These instructions cover cross-compilation for Debian Buster running on a Raspberry Pi 3B+, using a host machine running Debian Stretch with an x86_64 architecture:

Install target platform:

rustup target add aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu

Install toolchain:

rustup toolchain install nightly-aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu

Install aarch64-linux-gnu-gcc:

sudo apt-get install gcc-aarch64-linux-gnu

Configure the linker:

export CARGO_TARGET_AARCH64_UNKNOWN_LINUX_GNU_LINKER=/usr/bin/aarch64-linux-gnu-gcc

Alternatively, create a file named config in the ~/.cargo directory of the home user and add the following:

[target.aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu]
linker = "aarch64-linux-gnu-gcc"
objcopy = { path ="aarch64-linux-gnu-objcopy" }
strip = { path ="aarch64-linux-gnu-strip" }

The objcopy and strip parameters are needed by cargo deb when cross-compiling Debian packages.

Compile release build:

cargo build --release --target=aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu

The generated binary will be saved at target/aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu/release/name_of_crate