crossbuilt

Crossbuilt is a term used in software engineering to describe software that is produced through cross-building—the process of compiling and linking binaries on a host machine for a target platform or architecture different from the host. The concept is common in embedded systems, mobile development, and scenarios requiring binaries that run on multiple operating systems or hardware targets.

Origin and usage: The term is a portmanteau of cross- and built; it appears mainly in developer documentation and release notes to indicate artifacts generated by cross-compilation workflows rather than natively built binaries.

Process and tooling: A typical crossbuild workflow involves a cross-compilation toolchain, such as a cross-compiler, binutils, and target libraries; a build system (for example CMake, Meson, or Bazel) with a toolchain file; and optionally an emulator like QEMU for testing.

Challenges and advantages: Crossbuilt artifacts must cope with differences in endianness, ABIs, operating system APIs, and available dependencies. Benefits include faster iterative builds on a powerful host, easier testing across targets, and more predictable release artifacts in CI pipelines.

Examples and see also: Common scenarios include building ARM Linux binaries on x86_64 hosts, Windows binaries on Linux using MinGW-w64, and Android apps via the NDK. See also cross-compilation, cross-platform development, toolchain, and sysroot.