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gcc-arm-none-eabi Artifact

Portable binary distribution of the Arm GNU Toolchain (arm-none-eabi-gcc), the bare-metal GCC cross-compiler for ARM Cortex-M/Cortex-A embedded targets. This repository is consumed by the Embedbits Platform Artifact Handler to locate, download, verify, and configure the toolchain in downstream embedded (STM32 and related) projects.

This repository is split into three branches/refs by role — the main (master) branch you are reading now holds only this documentation; the handler scripts live on the Core branch, and versioned binaries are published as GitHub Releases anchored to the Bin branch.

Repository contents​

main / master
└── README.md                             ← This document — no other content

Core
├── ArtifactConfig.cmake                  ← Artifact metadata (name, version constraints, asset naming)
└── CMakeGccArmNoneEabiDefaults.cmake     ← Toolchain integration logic (artifact init, version lookup)

Bin  (anchor branch — no tracked binary files)
└── (empty commits only; each release tag points here)

Role in the platform​

This repository is one of several artifact distributions within the Embedbits platform. The overall flow is:

GitHub (Embedbits)
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Artifact-gcc-arm-none-eabi
  main / master →  README only (this document)
  Core          →  ArtifactConfig.cmake, CMakeGccArmNoneEabiDefaults.cmake
  Bin           →  Anchor branch (empty commits)
  Releases      →  gcc-arm-none-eabi-<version>-<platform>.zip + .hash
                    tagged Bin/<version>-<platform>  (platform: Win / Unix / DarwinARM)

A GccArmNoneEabi-style importer script publishes each toolchain version as a GitHub Release — tagged Bin/<version>-<platform> — rather than as a file committed to the Bin branch. The Bin branch itself only carries empty anchor commits for the release tags to point at.

The Platform Artifact Handler in downstream projects references the Core branch as a Git submodule. At CMake configure time it reads ArtifactConfig.cmake to determine which release to fetch, then downloads and verifies the matching release asset for the current platform.

Branch structure​

Branch / RefContent
main / masterThis README only — no functional content
CoreCMake handler scripts (ArtifactConfig.cmake, CMakeGccArmNoneEabiDefaults.cmake) for consuming the artifact
BinAnchor branch only — no binaries are committed here
Release tag Bin/<version>-<platform>GitHub Release carrying the actual .zip binary and its .hash checksum file as release assets, for platform ∈ Win, Unix, DarwinARM

Note: The Embedbits Artifact Handler protocol itself is not tied to GitHub Releases — that is simply how the GitHub-hosted importer scripts happen to publish binaries. On a Git host without an equivalent Releases API, the handler also supports packaged binaries committed directly as tracked files on the Bin branch, tagged per version/platform (Bin/<version>-<platform>) instead of uploaded as release assets. The CMake handler resolves either form transparently.

⚠️ Fetching a release​

Binaries are not stored as tracked files in Bin — clone the Core branch for the handler scripts, and download binaries as release assets for a specific tag instead of cloning the Bin branch.

# Core handler scripts
git clone --branch Core --single-branch --depth=1 <repository_url> gcc-arm-none-eabi-core

# Binary + checksum for one specific version/platform (GitHub Release asset)
gh release download Bin/13.2.Rel1-Unix --repo Embedbits/Artifact-gcc-arm-none-eabi --pattern "gcc-arm-none-eabi-13.2.Rel1-Unix.*"

Included components​

ComponentDescription
arm-none-eabi-gcc, arm-none-eabi-g++C and C++ cross-compiler drivers for Cortex-M/Cortex-A
arm-none-eabi-ar, arm-none-eabi-ld, arm-none-eabi-objcopy, arm-none-eabi-objdumpBundled Binutils cross-toolchain utilities
arm-none-eabi-gdbCross-debugger (where included in the upstream release)
Newlib / Newlib-nanoBundled C runtime library for bare-metal targets

Usage​

The artifact is installed automatically during the Artifacts setup phase via:

cmake -P Artifacts/GccArmNoneEabi/ArtifactConfig.cmake

The script ensures the toolchain is available, unpacks the archive if needed, and adds it to the system PATH for subsequent build steps.

Handler functions​

GccArmNoneEabi_ArtifactInit(ARTIFACT_BIN_PATH)

Initializes the artifact: locates (or downloads) the toolchain and exposes its bin/ directory at ARTIFACT_BIN_PATH.

GccArmNoneEabi_GetArtifactVersion()

Returns the version of the currently resolved toolchain.

Versioning​

Artifact versions correspond directly to official Arm GNU Toolchain release versions:

12.3.Rel1, 13.2.Rel1, 13.3.Rel1, ...

New versions are published by a GccArmNoneEabi-style importer script in the GithubArtifactsHandler repository, which downloads the official binaries, packages them as .zip archives with SHA-256 verification, and publishes them as a GitHub Release tagged Bin/<version>-<platform> — the Bin branch itself only advances via an empty anchor commit that the tag points to.

Notes​

  • No installation required — binaries are portable and self-contained.
  • Offline use is supported once the artifact is cached locally.
  • In Azure DevOps pipelines, caching the artifact folder is recommended to reduce build time.

License​

The Arm GNU Toolchain is distributed under the GNU General Public License (GPL), with the Newlib components under their own permissive licenses. For details, see: https://developer.arm.com/downloads/-/arm-gnu-toolchain-downloads

Authors​

Contributions are welcome! Please open a pull request.