On Sun, 15 Jun 2025 at 22:19, kpcyrd <kpcyrd@archlinux.org> wrote:

hello,

I've just changed minisign from C to Zig since this is now supported by upstream (it was quite the journey though). I noticed we don't have any packaging guideline for Zig yet so I would like to propose adding one.

The example based on my notes is quite straight-forward:

``` depends=( glibc ) makedepends=( zig )

build() { cd "${pkgname}-${pkgver}" zig build --verbose -Dcpu=baseline -Doptimize=ReleaseSmall }

package() { cd "${pkgname}-${pkgver}" install -Dm755 -t "${pkgdir}/usr/bin" zig-out/bin/example } ```

Common gotchas were:

- The `zig build` command is essentially fully silent if no interactive terminal is attached, `--verbose` helped but it's still very little info - Without `-Dcpu=baseline` the compiler is going to probe the build server cpu, which both causes problems with Reproducible Builds, but more importantly can also make the binary crash with `Illegal instruction` errors, since the default binaries aren't really distributable

Looking at the ncdu PKGBUILD shows there's some room for improvement:

``` build() { cd "${pkgname}-${pkgver}"

DESTDIR="build" zig build \ --summary all \ --global-cache-dir ../zig-global-cache \ --prefix /usr \ --search-prefix /usr \ --release=safe \ -Dtarget=native-linux.6.1-gnu.2.38 \ -Dcpu=baseline \ -Dpie=true }

check() { cd "${pkgname}-${pkgver}"

zig build test \ --summary all \ --global-cache-dir ../zig-global-cache \ --prefix /usr \ --search-prefix /usr \ --release=safe \ -Dtarget=native-linux.6.1-gnu.2.38 \ -Dcpu=baseline \ -Dpie=true } ```

More input very welcome, but I'm also fine with adding a very basic one by myself and whoever has something to add can just edit the wiki.

Never lose the plot, kpcyrd

Shouldn't we prefer ReleaseSafe or ReleaseSpeed? We generally don't use -Os CFLAGS, either.

On 16/6/25 06:18, kpcyrd wrote:

The example based on my notes is quite straight-forward:

``` depends=(   glibc ) makedepends=(   zig )

build() {   cd "${pkgname}-${pkgver}"   zig build --verbose -Dcpu=baseline -Doptimize=ReleaseSmall }

package() {   cd "${pkgname}-${pkgver}"   install -Dm755 -t "${pkgdir}/usr/bin" zig-out/bin/example } ```

Common gotchas were:

- The `zig build` command is essentially fully silent if no interactive terminal is attached, `--verbose` helped but it's still very little info - Without `-Dcpu=baseline` the compiler is going to probe the build server cpu, which both causes problems with Reproducible Builds, but more importantly can also make the binary crash with `Illegal instruction` errors, since the default binaries aren't really distributable

Looking at the ncdu PKGBUILD shows there's some room for improvement:

``` build() {   cd "${pkgname}-${pkgver}"

  DESTDIR="build" zig build \     --summary all \     --global-cache-dir ../zig-global-cache \     --prefix /usr \     --search-prefix /usr \     --release=safe \     -Dtarget=native-linux.6.1-gnu.2.38 \     -Dcpu=baseline \     -Dpie=true }

check() {   cd "${pkgname}-${pkgver}"

  zig build test \     --summary all \     --global-cache-dir ../zig-global-cache \     --prefix /usr \     --search-prefix /usr \     --release=safe \     -Dtarget=native-linux.6.1-gnu.2.38 \     -Dcpu=baseline \     -Dpie=true } ```

More input very welcome, but I'm also fine with adding a very basic one by myself and whoever has something to add can just edit the wiki.

I've been the defacto zig package maintainer for a bit now. Good packages to look at are ncdu, river, waylock. Guidelines off the top of my head: - Indeed make sure you don't forget `-Dcpu=baseline` - zig targets include a kernel version and glibc version; make sure you include them! - Leave the target architecture as `native` so that archlinuxarm can pick up the package automatically - Add build.zig.zon dependencies to the `sources` array so they get archived correctly; they also need to be added to `noextract` We should probably write a script to automate this. - Use prepare() to build a build-environment-local global package cache - Use `--system ../zig-global-cache/p` to then use that package cache - Consider `--summary all` to get some build output - `package()` should usually be `cp -a build/* "$pkgdir` rather than trying to `install` files individually