# Linux sysroot images The chromium build system for Linux will (by default) use a sysroot image rather than building against the libraries installed on the host system. This serves several purposes. Firstly, it ensures that binaries will run on all supported linux systems independent of the packages installed on the build machine. Secondly, it makes the build more hermetic, preventing issues that arise for variations among developers' systems. The sysroot consists of a minimal installation of Debian/stable (or old-stable) to ensure maximum compatibility. Pre-built sysroot images are stored in Google Cloud Storage and downloaded during `gclient runhooks` ## Installing the sysroot images Installation of the sysroot is performed by `build/linux/sysroot_scripts/install-sysroot.py`. This script can be run manually but is normally run as part of gclient hooks. When run from hooks this script in a no-op on non-linux platforms. ## Rebuilding the sysroot image The pre-built sysroot images occasionally needs to be rebuilt. For example, when security updates to Debian are released, or when a new package is needed by the chromium build. If you just want to update the sysroots without adding any new packages, skip to `Using build_and_upload.py`. ### Adding new packages To add a new package, edit the `sysroot-creator-*.sh` scripts and modify the `DEBIAN_PACKAGES` list. ### Rebuilding To rebuild the images (without any changes) run the following commands: $ cd build/linux/sysroot_scripts $ ./sysroot-creator-stretch.sh BuildSysrootAll The above command will rebuild the sysroot for all architectures. To build just one architecture use `BuildSysroot`. Run the script with no arguments for a list of possible architectures. For example: $ ./sysroot-creator-stretch.sh BuildSysrootAmd64 This command on its own should be a no-op and produce an image identical to the one on Google Cloud Storage. ### Uploading new images To upload images to Google Cloud Storage run the following command: $ ./sysroot-creator-stretch.sh UploadSysrootAll Here you should use the SHA1 of the git revision at which the images were created. Uploading new images to Google Clound Storage requires write permission on the `chrome-linux-sysroot` bucket. ### Rolling the sysroot version used by chromium Once new images have been uploaded, the `sysroots.json` file needs to be updated to reference the new versions. This process is manual and involves updating the `Revision` and `Sha1Sum` values in the file. ### Using `build-and-upload.py` The `build_and_upload.py` script automates the above four steps. It is recommended to use this just before you're ready to submit your CL, after you've already tested one of the updated sysroots on your local configuration. Build or upload failures will not produce detailed output, but will list the script and arguments that caused the failure. To debug this, you must run the failing command manually. This script requires Google Cloud Storage write permission on the `chrome-linux-sysroot` bucket.