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xPack LLVM clang v15.0.7-1 released

· 5 min read
Liviu Ionescu (ilg)
Liviu Ionescu (ilg)

Version 15.0.7-1 is a new release; it follows the upstream release.

The xPack LLVM clang is a standalone cross-platform binary distribution of LLVM clang.

There are separate binaries for Windows (x64), macOS (x64, arm64) and GNU/Linux (x64, arm64 and arm).

Raspberry Pi

The main targets for the GNU/Linux Arm binaries are the Raspberry Pi class devices (armv7l and aarch64; armv6 is not supported).

Download​

The binary files are available from GitHub Releases.

Prerequisites​

  • x64 GNU/Linux: any system with GLIBC 2.27 or higher (like Ubuntu 18 or later, Debian 10 or later, RedHat 8 or later, Fedora 29 or later, etc)
  • arm64/arm GNU/Linux: any system with GLIBC 2.27 or higher (like Raspberry Pi OS, Ubuntu 18 or later, Debian 10 or later, RedHat 8 or later, Fedora 29 or later, etc)
  • x64 Windows: Windows 7 with the Universal C Runtime (UCRT), Windows 8, Windows 10
  • x64 macOS: 10.13 or later
  • arm64 macOS: 11.6 or later

Install​

The easiest way to install this specific version, is by using xpm:

xpm install @xpack-dev-tools/clang@15.0.7-1.1 -verbose

Comprehensive instructions for installing xPack LLVM clang on different platforms can be found in the Install Guide.

Compliance​

The xPack LLVM clang generally follows the official LLVM clang releases.

The current version is based on:

  • LLVM clang version 15.0.7, from 12 Jan 2023.

LLVM libraries​

The compiler defaults are set to use the LLVM libraries (libc++ and compiler-rt).

-m32 / -m64​

For x64 GNU/Linux and Windows, multilib libraries are provided and can be selected using the -m32 / -m64 options.

-print-search-dirs​

Since the toolchain can be installed in any location, and the binaries compiled with it need to access the libraries, it is necessary to get the actual path and pass it via LD_LIBRARY_PATH and/or set the -rpath.

This can be achieved by querying the compiler for -print-search-dirs and processing the output.

For example, for the 32-bit libraries:

${CXX} -m32 -print-search-dirs | grep 'libraries: =' | sed -e 's|libraries: =||'

On Windows this might be slightly more complicated, to get rid of the letter part of the paths.

Changes​

Compared to the upstream, there are no functional changes.

Bug fixes​

  • none

Enhancements​

  • none

Known problems​

  • some of the less used compiler run-time libraries are missing from the macOS binaries; fixed in 15.0.7-2
  • on macOS, the /Library/Developer/CommandLineTools/usr/include/c++/v1 was added to the include path; unfortunately this may crash some builds; removed in 15.0.7-3
  • on GNU/Linux, for consistency with macOS and Windows, in 15.9.7-[12] the defaults were changed from GNU libstdc++ to clang libc++; unfortunately this breaks some tools that probe various compiler capabilities (like meson); the defaults on GNU/Linux were reverted to libstdc++ in 15.0.7-3
  • when clang is invoked via a link from a different folder, the InstalledDir does not reflect the correct install folder, and the new clang system headers are either not found or the host system headers are used; fixed in 15.0.7-4
  • in certain conditions, the binaries compiled with -flto may fail.

Documentation​

The original documentation is available online.

Build​

The binaries for all supported platforms (Windows, macOS and GNU/Linux) were built using the xPack Build Box (XBB), a set of build environments based on slightly older distributions, that should be compatible with most recent systems.

The scripts used to build this distribution are in:

  • distro-info/scripts

For the prerequisites and more details on the build procedure, please see the README-MAINTAINER page.

CI tests​

Before publishing, a set of simple tests were performed on an exhaustive set of platforms. The results are available from:

Tests​

The binaries were tested on a variety of platforms, but mainly to check the integrity of the build, not the compiler functionality.

Checksums​

The SHA-256 hashes for the files are:

b109ad97d44107d3734846d8fa3cd20cfb21664c0d3ff03067a2f5f589593d28
xpack-clang-15.0.7-1-darwin-arm64.tar.gz

51bb18640e551ccd8bd1bdfec70434cd1de7c60dc532c6186829be1d040c96d3
xpack-clang-15.0.7-1-darwin-x64.tar.gz

d4ed651d041044f010a377ebea1d9f315a7ac439f1d8ee6bce0e0e021afd4583
xpack-clang-15.0.7-1-linux-arm.tar.gz

9058f76694d7fc6a9a4a73598dab98d11b96c93c4b3d312e963917bab9c14738
xpack-clang-15.0.7-1-linux-arm64.tar.gz

30e6885fc1b4674d2d4766616af84627a4b5bdd2655e25ca8639e01b87b368c0
xpack-clang-15.0.7-1-linux-x64.tar.gz

2e16a80e5a4fa19afb58f1b39f154faa129659ace2710324bd24f1702de46409
xpack-clang-15.0.7-1-win32-x64.zip

Deprecation notices​

32-bit support​

Support for 32-bit x86 GNU/Linux and x86 Windows was dropped in 2022. Support for 32-bit Arm GNU/Linux (armv7l) will be preserved for a while, due to the large user base of 32-bit Raspberry Pi systems.

GNU/Linux minimum requirements​

Support for RedHat 7 was dropped in 2022 and the minimum requirement was raised to GLIBC 2.27, available starting with Ubuntu 18, Debian 10 and RedHat 8.

Download analytics​

Credit to Shields IO for the badges and to Somsubhra/github-release-stats for the individual file counters.