Proposal and RFC: i386-pc-linux-newlib

[Shaun Jackman]

I maintain the package of newlib for Debian. Currently that package
includes the libraries, headers, and so forth, but not a proper
toolchain. I'd like to package a gcc toolchain that links against
newlib by default. Most likely this toolchain would simply be a
wrapper for the host's usual gcc, while munging up the search paths.
I'd like to call this toolchain i386-pc-linux-newlib, or
i386-linux-newlib for short. That made me think though, that perhaps
this could be a proper triple added to config.sub with support as a
--host setting in the build process. At the very least, it would
enable --with-newlib by default and set the binary prefix. Comments?

This work can be compared to similar work in the buildroot project,
which maintains an xxx-linux-uclibc toolchain.

For myself, a primary goal of this work is that I'd like to be able to
build busybox out of the box with newlib by simply setting
CROSS=i386-linux-newlib-, thus finally calling newlib a "supported"
target of busybox. For the curious, my true goal is to build busybox
for the ARM processor with a newlib arm-elf toolchain.

Cheers,
Shaun