Usually one rpm depends on many other packages or libs. This is not easy for massive deployment without internet access.
Since yum can automatically resolve dependencies. Is it possible to build a portable executable? So that we can copy it to other machines with the same OS.
If you want a known collection of RPMs to install, yum offers a downloadonly plugin. With that, you should be able to collect all the associated RPMs in one shot to install what you wanted on a disconnected machine.
The general way to build a binary without runtime library dependencies is to build it to be static, ie. using the -static argument to gcc, which links in static versions of the libraries required such that they're included in the resulting executable. This doesn't bundle in any data file dependencies or external executables (ie. libexec-style helpers), but simpler applications often don't need them.
For more complex needs (where data files are involved, or elements of the dependency chain can't be linked in for one reason or another), consider using AppImageKit -- which bundles an application and its dependency chain into a runnable ISO. See docs/links at PortableLinuxApps.org.
In neither of these cases does rpm or yum have anything to do with it. It's certainly possible to build an RPM that packages static executables, but that's a matter of changing the %build section of the spec file such that it passes -static to gcc, not of doing anything RPM-specific.
To be clear, by the way -- there are compelling reasons why we don't use static libraries all the time!
Using shared libraries means that applying a security update to a library only means replacing the library itself, not recompiling all applications using it.
Using shared libraries is more memory-efficient, since the single shared copy of the library in memory can be used by multiple applications.
Using shared libraries means your executables don't need to include full copies of all the libraries they use, making them much smaller.
Related
In order to understand ICU and its APIs, I wrote a sample program and the libraries this code would link against are -licuuc and -licui18n. The libraries were available because the libicu-devel.x86_64 package was installed on the test system.
In my quest to understand how to integrate ICU library with my application that is targeted for a centOS platform, I stumbled across this page, which says:
For simple use of ICU's predefined data, this section on data management can safely be skipped. The data is built into a library that is loaded along with the rest of ICU. No specific action or setup is required of either the application program or the execution environment.
This indicates that if the application has no intention of adding its own data, the data available in the libraries can be used. On my test system where ICU is installed, these are the files:
$ sudo find . -name "*icu*"
./opt/rbt_boost/include/boost/regex/icu.hpp
./lib64/libicui18n.so.42
./lib64/libicui18n.so.42.1
./lib64/libicuuc.so.42.1
./lib64/libicuuc.so.42
./usr/lib64/libicui18n.so.42
./usr/lib64/libicule.so
./usr/lib64/libicuio.so.42
./usr/lib64/libicutu.so
./usr/lib64/libiculx.so.42.1
./usr/lib64/pkgconfig/icu.pc
./usr/lib64/libicui18n.so
./usr/lib64/libicui18n.so.42.1
./usr/lib64/libicule.so.42.1
./usr/lib64/libicuuc.so.42.1
./usr/lib64/libiculx.so
./usr/lib64/libicuuc.so.42
./usr/lib64/libicuio.so.42.1
./usr/lib64/icu
./usr/lib64/libicudata.so.42
./usr/lib64/libicule.so.42
./usr/lib64/libicutu.so.42.1
./usr/lib64/libicuio.so
./usr/lib64/libicudata.so
./usr/lib64/libicudata.so.42.1
./usr/lib64/libiculx.so.42
./usr/lib64/libicutu.so.42
./usr/lib64/libicuuc.so
./usr/bin/icu-config
./usr/share/icu
./usr/share/man/man1/icu-config.1.gz
./var/lib/yum/yumdb/l/e59bf24facac0acba1622a5180d0e2a22dda69c8-libicu-devel-4.2.1-9.1.el6_2-x86_64
./var/lib/yum/yumdb/l/7062f72703a5afbf894d617b94db3d4769fe643d-libicu-4.2.1-9.1.el6_2-x86_64
Questions:
Which of these ICU libraries (and files) should be packaged with the application for ICU data to be available at run time? As mentioned earlier, I used libicui18n and libicuuc libraries for linking, so these need to be present.
Aside from the above two libraries, libicudata, going by the name, seems to be the obvious candidate. Correct?
Is there a static version of libicui18n and libicuuc libraries available for use or does one have to build it?
In general, what is the process followed for integrating ICU with a product?
Thanks!
ICU always needs to link against its data library.
Here's a very general discussion about which libraries you ened.
ICU has to be built with the --enable-static option to allow static linkage.
Ideally you will want to use pkg-config to manage your linkage against ICU.
If you are on centOS, rather than linking statically (with its headaches), you might consider just compiling against the libicu-devel package (using pkg-config as mentioned above) and then at run time your users can just include the appropriate libicu package.
I am trying to install a software on a cluster running Linux without root. However, the software requires some non-standard libraries before it could be installed. I installed the required libraries in my home directory. When I used ./configure to compile the software's source code, I got an error message saying that it couldn't find library files.
I tried using CPPFLAGS, LDFLAGS, and LD_LIBRARY_PATH to tell the compiler where to find the libraries, but it did not seem to work.
How can I install a non-standard library without administrative privileges and tell the compiler where to find that library? Should I also do the same thing for other libraries too?
I'm afraid that the exact process for doing so entirely depends on how the software's actual script, and/or Makefile, and/or code. There is no universal answer that works with every software package in existence. Each one's configuration script is unique, and different.
It also depends, in some part, to how the libraries get installed in the nonstandard location. Quite often the library package would include one of several configuration mechanisms that applications that use the library must use in order to configure themselves to the library; a part of which includes the necessary mojo to link the software application to put the correct RPATH into the software application's executable, so that it can load the libraries from the right location; this typically involves the variables you mentioned. One thing you didn't mention is specifying the -R flag to set the RPATH in the executable.
So, the only answer here is for you to keep digging into the library's and the application's configuration scripts, and try to figure it out. There's just no other way to do this, except by brute force. In many cases, it's just not possible to do what you're trying to do "out of the box", and it becomes necessary to patch one or the other's configure script, so that the "right thing" happens.
Set PKG_CONFIG_PATH while building binaries that link against previously installed libraries:
export PKG_CONFIG_PATH="/home/user/dir/install/lib/pkgconfig:$PKG_CONFIG_PATH"
When executing binaries compiled against those libraries, set LD_LIBRARY_PATH
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH="/home/user/dir/install/lib:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH"
If you execute binaries installed in non-standard locations, set PATH too:
export PATH="/home/user/dir/install/sbin:/home/user/dir/install/bin:$PATH"
You might want to set the last two in your .bashrc for future use.
Putting the previous variable settings at the end of the string gives higher precedence to the non-standard library and binary locations, if files exist in both places. Consider switching them around if you prefer using programs installed through your package manager.
What is the best practice for deploying dependencies on Linux when shipping an own application?
Some SO posts recommend to include all dependencies in the package (utilizing LD_LIBRARY_PATH), other posts recommend to only ship the binary and use the "dependency" feature of the DEB/RPM packages instead. I tried to use the second approach, but immediately ran into the problem that one dependency (libicu52) doesn't seem to be available in certain Linux distributions yet. For example, in my OpenSuse test installation only "libicu51" is available in the package manager.
I initially thought that the whole idea of the packaging system is to avoid duplicate SO files in the system. But does it really work (see above), or should I rather ship all dependencies with my app, to make sure that it runs on all distributions?
For custom application, which "does not care" about distribution-specific packaging, versioning, it's upgrades, etc,. I would recommend to redistribute dependencies manually.
You can use RPATH linker option, by it's setting value to $ORIGIN you will tell linker to search libraries in directory, relative to that binary file, without need to pre-set LD_LIBRARY_PATH before execution:
gcc -Wl,-rpath,'$ORIGIN/../lib'
Example taken from here.
I am working on bindings for a cpp library.
To do this I wrote a capi / wrapper for the library and compiled that to a shared lib (.so file).
My question is, how do I then use and integrate this file into cargo without forcing the user to install it? Currently I build the cpp via a Makefile called from the build variable in Cargo.toml, but I am unsure what to do with the compiled lib.
For testing, I can either use rpath or LD_LIBRARY_PATH to point the executable to the right location, but this will not work when distributing a library.
How are people managing this?
First of all, determine whether you really need a shared library. It's not clear from your question, but if you compiled your own wrapper into a shared library, that's probably unnecessary - you can compile your code into a static library and link it directly into your executable.
Moreover, you can try to link that third-party library statically too. I don't think this should be hard. And yes, you need to use build command in the manifest to do all of this now.
However, if you still need to use a shared library and you don't want the end user to install it herself (which is strange, because that's the point of shared libraries), you have to distribute it manually. For example, you can write a makefile which assembles an archive which your users may extract and use. For your program to find the library correctly you will either have the user to install this archive into the system root directory (e.g. /usr on linux; then this shared library will be located automatically) or you will have to write small shell script wrapper around your executable which will locate the shared library and set appropriate LD_LIBRARY_PATH.
I'd go for the first path. Usually all major platforms provide means to create installation packages (deb/rpm/pkg.tar.xz/whatever on Linux, brew on Mac, windows installer on Windows, though on Windows you can just put your shared library in the same directory as the executable and it will work). You just have to create packages for the platform your users work on, so your program will be installed in correct directories and your shared library will be resolved automatically.
I am developing cross-platform Qt application.
It is freeware though not open-source. Therefore I want to distribute it as a compiled binary.
On windows there is no problem, I pack my compiled exe along with MinGW's and Qt's DLLs and everything goes great.
But on Linux there is a problem because the user may have shared libraries in his/her system very different from mine.
Qt deployment guide suggests two methods: static linking and using shared libraries.
The first produces huge executable and also require static versions of many libraries which Qt depends on, i.e. I'll have to rebuild all of them from scratches. The second method is based on reconfiguring dynamic linker right before the application startup and seems a bit tricky to me.
Can anyone share his/her experience in distributing Qt applications under Linux? What method should I use? What problems may I confront with? Are there any other methods to get this job done?
Shared libraries is the way to go, but you can avoid using LD_LIBRARY_PATH (which involves running the application using a launcher shell script, etc) building your binary with the -rpath compiler flag, pointing to there you store your libraries.
For example, I store my libraries either next to my binary or in a directory called "mylib" next to my binary. To use this on my QMake file, I add this line in the .pro file:
QMAKE_LFLAGS += -Wl,-rpath,\\$\$ORIGIN/lib/:\\$\$ORIGIN/../mylib/
And I can run my binaries with my local libraries overriding any system library, and with no need for a launcher script.
You can also distribute Qt shared libraries on Linux. Then, get your software to load those instead of the system default ones. Shared libraries can be over-ridden using the LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable. This is probably the simplest solution for you. You can always change this in a wrapper script for your executable.
Alternatively, just specify the minimum library version that your users need to have installed on the system.
When we distribute Qt apps on Linux (or really any apps that use shared libraries) we ship a directory tree which contains the actual executable and associated wrapper script at the top with sub-directories containing the shared libraries and any other necessary resources that you don't want to link in.
The advantage of doing this is that you can have the wrapper script setup everything you need for running the application without having to worry about having the user set environment variables, install to a specific location, etc. If done correctly, this also allows you to not have to worry about from where you are calling the application because it can always find the resources.
We actually take this tree structure even further by placing all the executable and shared libraries in platform/architecture sub-directories so that the wrapper script can determine the local architecture and call the appropriate executable for that platform and set the environment variables to find the appropriate shared libraries. We found this setup to be particularly helpful when distributing for multiple different linux versions that share a common file system.
All this being said, we do still prefer to build statically when possible, Qt apps are no exception. You can definitely build with Qt statically and you shouldn't have to go build a lot of additional dependencies as krbyrd noted in his response.
sybreon's answer is exactly what I have done. You can either always add your libraries to LD_LIBRARY_PATH or you can do something a bit more fancy:
Setup your shipped Qt libraries one per directory. Write a shell script, have it run ldd on the executable and grep for 'not found', for each of those libraries, add the appropriate directory to a list (let's call it $LDD). After you have them all, run the binary with LD_LIBRARY_PATH set to it's previous value plus $LDD.
Finally a comment about "I'll have to rebuild all of them from scratches". No, you won't have to. If you have the dev packages for those libraries, you should have .a files, you can statically link against these.
Not an answer as such (sybreon covered that), but please note that you are not allowed to distribute your binary if it is statically linked against Qt, unless you have bought a commercial license, otherwise your entire binary falls under the GPL (or you're in violation of Qt's license.)
If you have a commercial license, never mind.
If you don't have a commercial license, you have two options:
Link dynamically against Qt v4.5.0 or newer (the LGPL versions - you may not use the previous versions except in open source apps), or
Open your source code.
The probably easiest way to create a Qt application package on Linux is probably linuxdeployqt. It collects all required files and lets you build an AppImage which runs on most Linux distributions.
Make sure you build the application on the oldest still-supported Ubuntu LTS release so your AppImage can be listed on AppImageHub.
You can look into QtCreator folder and use it as an example. It has qt.conf and qtcreator.sh files in QtCreator/bin.
lib/qtcreator is the folder with all needed Qt *.so libraries. Relative path is set inside qtcreator.sh, which should be renamed to you-app-name.sh
imports,plugins,qml are inside bin directory. Path to them is set in qt.conf file. This is needed for QML applications deployment.
This article has information on the topic. I will try it myself:
http://labs.trolltech.com/blogs/2009/06/02/deploying-a-browser-on-gnulinux/
In a few words:
Configure Qt with -platform linux-lsb-g++
Linking should be done
with –lsb-use-default-linker
Package everything and deploy (will
need a few tweaks here but I haven't yet tried it sorry)