Topic: Chumby firmware switching toolchains!

Starting with Ironforge firmware version 1.7, Chumby will be using a new toolchain to create binaries.

Firmware versions 1.6 and earlier have used GCC 4.1.2/OABI, but we are switching to GCC 4.3.2/EABI.

The implication for software developers is that binaries compiled using the older toolchain will generally not work on the new firmware, and will need to be rebuilt using the new toolchain.  The primary reason is that EABI ("embedded application binary interface") uses a different function calling method than OABI ("old application binary interface"), so they're incompatible.

An OABI binary that's *statically* linked may still work.

There were several benefits to updating the toolchain - the previous toolchain and libraries had several bugs that caused incorrect output under certain circumstances, ARM optimizations typically did not work, EABI is the current standard, and support for mixtures of hard and soft floats is now possible.  The toolchain we're moving to is the same one used by many other embedded systems and is recommended by ARM.

Some developers that have experienced some problems with the previous toolchain should have better results - for instance, it will be possible to build a working version of Webkit.

To get a head start of using the new toolchain, please see this wiki page.

Re: Chumby firmware switching toolchains!

Yay!
Thanks Duane.  Off to create a new VM for this smile

Is this a sign that 1.7 is imminent as well?