Heh? Debian cross toolchains work fine: https://packages.debian.org/sid/gcc-4.9-arm-linux-gnueabi for armel and https://packages.debian.org/sid/gcc-4.9-arm-linux-gnueabihf for armhf

Those packages haven't been in Debian for that long but I'm sure as hell glad they are.

Cross compilers are still really difficult.

Cool if you're running Debian.

Well, not having to build your own cross-compilers is a HUGE reason to run Debian. Other distros probably have packages too in any case.

OSX.

Right. Get something better.

Crosstool-NG will take care of that.

Find a vagrant Debian image and it doesn't much matter what you run.

Cross compiling is such a pain that it is worth avoiding it if at all possible.

I'd recommend just using a project like buildroot - it's really easy to begin with, and afterwards every odd device you eventually decide you need to cross compile for (old router with a MIPS CPU, etc.) becomes just as easy.

I have one of the new Pi's with 1GB ram. With a fast 64GB microsd card ($21 on black friday). I've been pretty impressed with fast it compiles with make -j4.

Yes especially the difference with the very first A model is night and day :]

Great, this brings me one step closer to a dream: setting up distcc on every computer in the house so I can build rPi software in seconds, not hours..

Couldn't tell from the guide, is this armv6 (A/A+, B/B+, Compute) or armv7 (B2)?

I went one step further and built a Canadian that was built on x64, ran on raspberry pi, and targeted teensy cortex m4!

https://github.com/jwatte/teensy-canadian

thanks for sharing! understanding how to cross-compile is increasingly important for upcoming (cheap) embedded hardware. maybe related a blog post on compiling a sketch for Arduino: http://thinkingonthinking.com/an-arduino-sketch-from-scratch...

You might consider building Linaro instead, especially if you are going to use a RPI 2.