Use Static Libraries for `sta`

[Et-okapi]

I have been working with the sta binary file successfully on my WSL ubuntu 20.04. Because I need to run sta on my other docker(I am asked not to install more dependencies on it), I've encountered an issue where it requires dynamic libraries.

Would it be possible to update the build configuration (e.g., CMakeLists.txt) to link all dependencies statically?

[jjcherry56]

You can add an option to the cmake file to support static linking and submit a pull request.

[QuantamHD]

If you build OpenSTA through the bazel build in OpenROAD it'll be statically linked. If that's preferable over modifying the cmake build

https://github.com/The-OpenROAD-Project/OpenROAD

bazelisk build //src/sta:opensta

[jjcherry56]

The opensta built in openroad does not use the opensta repo. Proceed at your own risk.

[QuantamHD]

The opensta built in openroad does not use the opensta repo. Proceed at your own risk.

Plus 1

[akashlevy]

A solution I recommend is using patchelf to change the RPATH of the binary to wherever your .so libraries live. Something like:

patchelf --force-rpath --set-rpath '$ORIGIN/lib' sta

Then you can just drop libtclreadline-2.3.8.so and libtcl8.6.so into a directory called lib/ which is in the same directory as your binary.

NOTE: if this command is going into a Makefile, you'll want to remember to use $$ORIGIN instead of $ORIGIN to prevent var replacement!