Generated Linux release binaries may not run on systems with older glibc

[luqmana]

Our x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu release currently get built in CI on a ubuntu-20.04 image. That's often newer than whatever glibc is used by some distros like CentOS or Rocky.

This is not a new issue for building releases in CI (and there's one solution mentioned in that blog post). I also noticed we use cargo-dist which might be able to just handle this soon^™?

[sunshowers]

This can be solved by building against a docker container with Ubuntu 18.04 (I've run into the same issue with nextest). Happy to help tomorrow if required.

[sunshowers]

(Another option is to build with the musl target.)

[sunshowers]

So having looked at the solutions here:

I think the best solution would be for cargo-dist to support musl and/or zigbuild. (If we use openssl then the musl solution becomes hairy, but if we manage to make it work we'll have a completely static binary which is great). However, both of these things will depend on cargo-dist support.

As a workaround for now, if we decide on a set of minimum distro versions supported, we can build on them. Going by https://repology.org/project/glibc/versions (love the link!):

• Debian 10 is on glibc 2.28
• CentOS/Rocky/Alma Linux (and presumably RedHat) 8 are on glibc 2.28
• Ubuntu 18.04, which is in extended support, is on glibc 2.27

Based on this, I'd suggest we:

• Create a docker container based on any one of the above distros (maybe Ubuntu 18.04 since it's slightly older)
• As part of building the container, install whatever packages we need (see this script for a reference)
• Build within that container.

[ahl]

I'm going to check in with the axo folks to see if they're interested in adding this to cargo-dist soon.