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xPack GNU M4 v1.4.20-1 released

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

Version 1.4.20-1.1 is a new release; it follows the upstream release.

The xPack GNU M4 is a standalone cross-platform binary distribution of GNU M4.

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

Raspberry Pi

The main targets for the GNU/Linux Arm binaries are the Raspberry Pi class devices (aarch64 only; armv6 and armv7l are no longer supported).

Download​

The binary files are available from GitHub Releases.

Prerequisites​

  • x64 macOS: 11.0 or later
  • arm64 macOS: 11.0 or later
  • x64 GNU/Linux: any system with GLIBC 2.28 or higher (like Ubuntu 20 or later, Debian 10 or later, RedHat 8 or later, Fedora 29 or later, etc)
  • arm64 GNU/Linux: any system with GLIBC 2.28 or higher (like Raspberry Pi OS, Ubuntu 20 or later, Debian 10 or later, RedHat 8 or later, Fedora 29 or later, etc)

Install​

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

xpm install @xpack-dev-tools/m4@1.4.20-1.1 -verbose

Comprehensive instructions for installing xPack GNU M4 on different platforms can be found in the Install Guide.

Compliance​

The xPack GNU M4 is based on the official GNU M4 sources.

The current version is based on:

  • GNU M4 version 1.4.20 from 10 May 2025.

Changes​

Compared to the upstream version, there are no functional changes.

Bug fixes​

  • none

Enhancements​

  • none

Known problems​

  • none

Documentation​

The original documentation is available from the project web site:

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.

For the prerequisites and more details on the build procedure, please see the Maintainer Info page.

CI tests​

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

Tests​

TBD

Checksums​

The SHA-256 hashes for the files are:

eec5cca7634e7ea463f044fb3d233a472de62932f1889f12fd8ca06ba5b7609e
xpack-m4-1.4.20-1-darwin-arm64.tar.gz

1329aa4237a933fe7f63e0c5922ea271a79a7d56ab7e1424f77f949f838777b5
xpack-m4-1.4.20-1-darwin-x64.tar.gz

bc5fa98051abab8a8410499d89065c3554be7c1ca0574e85367a14d0764cfdfb
xpack-m4-1.4.20-1-linux-arm64.tar.gz

f593eeefafc59f33c323ce350b50e91f7c58917abef3320c3b118facbf370725
xpack-m4-1.4.20-1-linux-x64.tar.gz

Folders hierarchy​

After install, the package creates a hierarchy of folders like the following (only the first two depth levels are shown):

$ tree -L 2 ~/Library/xPacks/{{packageScopedName}}/1.4.20-1.1/.content/
/Users/ilg/Library/xPacks/{{packageScopedName}}/1.4.20-1.1/.content/
├── bin
│   ├── gm4 -> m4
│   └── m4
├── distro-info
│   └── licenses
├── libexec
│   └── libiconv.2.dylib
├── README.md
└── share
  └── info

7 directories, 4 files

Deprecation notices​

GNU/Linux minimum requirements​

The minimum requirement is GLIBC 2.28, available starting with Ubuntu 20, Debian 10 and RedHat 8. Support for RedHat 7 was dropped in 2022. Support for Ubuntu 18 was dropped in 2025.

32-bit support​

Support for 32-bit x64 GNU/Linux and x64 Windows was dropped in 2022 and for 32-bit Arm GNU/Linux in 2025.

Pre-deprecation notice for x64 macOS​

Apple has discontinued support for the x64 (Intel) architecture. GitHub will no longer support this architecture on macOS after the macOS 15 runner image is retired in November 2027; building and testing x64 macOS binaries will become more difficult, requiring a self-hosted runner, and cannot be guaranteed in the long term.

You should begin migrating your projects to arm64-based (Apple Silicon) binaries to prepare for this possible deprecation.

Analytics​

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