Cross Compiling Netatalk 2.2.1 for DD-WRT on Ubuntu 11.10

Here is an update on how to cross compile netatalk for dd-wrt. Once again I have my Netgear WNR3500L as my target device. I recently upgraded to Ubuntu 11.10 which to my surprise works pretty good! I am very satisfied with  it. But let's get started. Fire up you terminals.

In case you want to take a shortcut here are the modified makefiles:

netatalk.mk
libdb.mk


If you did not already do so you have to install  bison, flex, texinfo and subversion:


> sudo apt-get install bison flex texinfo subversion


Now we can retrieve the optware packages und install our toolchain. Change to a directory you want this workspace located and execute:

> svn co http://svn.nslu2-linux.org/svnroot/optware/trunk optware


Setup the target environment once the checkout returns successfully:


> cd optware
> make ddwrt-target
> cd ddwrt
> make directories ipkg-utils toolchain


Note: the target depends on your router and the build of dd-wrt you have installed! The dd-wrt-target happens to fit in this case. Read up on what target system you need before starting out!


The compiling of the toolchain might take some time. I ran into some trouble building the toolchain. In two cases the packages were not found. For the binutils package I changed to a different mirror. In order to do so I modified the binutils.mk in optware/ddwrt/toolchain/buildroot/toolchain/binutils/. I replaced all references of the kernel.org site with http://ftp-stud.hs-esslingen.de/Mirrors/ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/devel/binutils/. Beware this mirror might change in the future. A more suitable fix should be used. This was just a quick fix!


Also I had to change the version indicator for the gdb package. The character 'a' was appended. I updated the gdb.mk file in optware/ddwrt/toolchain/buildroot/toolchain/gdb/ to reflect this modification (around line 8):


GDB_SOURCE:=gdb-$(GDB_VERSION)a.tar.bz2


Now we can get started. First we need to build the dependencies (openssl, libgcrypt and libdb):


> make openssl-stage
> make libgcrypt-stage


I use libdb 4.7.25. In order to build that particular version I altered the libdb.mk in optware/ddwrt/make/:


LIBDB_VERSION=4.7.25
LIBDB_LIB_VERSION=4.7


Secondly we need to add a configuration flag (around line 127):

--with-mutex=MIPS/gcc-assembly \

This configuration flag is important so libdb is not linked against libpthread. When this flag is not set libdb will not play nice with netatalk and OS X will create a warning each and every time you want to access a share. Save the changes and compile!


> make libdb-ipk
> make libdb-stage


Next we modify the netatalk.mk file in optware/ddwrt/make/ to reflect the new version. Also I disabled one patch and added support for the cnid-cdb-backend:


NETATALK_VERSION=2.2.1 #(around line 8)


NETATALK_PATCHES +=#$(NETATALK_SOURCE_DIR)/afp_asp_include.patch #(around line 55)


--with-cnid-cdb-backend \ #(around line 149)



#$(PATCH_LIBTOOL) $(@D)/libtool #(around line 162)
#sed -i -e "s/db_strerror/db_strerror$(DB_VERSION)/g" $(@D)/etc/cnid_dbd/dbif.c
#sed -i -e "s/db_create/db_create$(DB_VERSION)/g" $(@D)/etc/cnid_dbd/dbif.c
#sed -i -e "s/db_env_create/db_env_create$(DB_VERSION)/g" $(@D)/etc/cnid_dbd/dbif.c
#touch $@



That should be it. Build the netatalk 2.2.1 ipk:


> make netatalk-ipk


In optware/ddwrt/builds the netatalk_2.2.1-2_mipsel.ipk should have appeared. Transfer the package to you router and proceed with the install. Remove the previous version of libdb first and install the new libdb package:


> ipkg install libdb_4.7.25-3_mipsel.ipk


Then backup your netatalk settings for they will be replaced. Mine are in /opt/etc/netatalk/. Upgrade the previous netatalk version to the new one.


> killall afpd
> ipkg install netatalk_2.2.1-2_mipsel.ipk


Now you can restore your settings and start netatalk again:


> afpd -D