Cross Compiling for Debian Based Linux

To build for a target architecture different than the host (e.g. using x64 to build for ARM), you'll need to do the following:

One-Time Setup

1. install prerequisites:

sudo apt-get install qemu qemu-user-static debootstrap gcc-arm-linux-gnueabihf g++-arm-linux-gnueabihf

2. create a chroot/rootfs for the target architecture:

sudo qemu-debootstrap --arch=armhf --variant=minbase xenial rootfs

3. install libx11-dev on the chroot/rootfs:

sudo chroot rootfs apt-get install -y libx11-dev

Build

1. point to the target toolchain on the build host:

export CC=$(which arm-linux-gnueabihf-gcc)

export CXX="$(which arm-linux-gnueabihf-g++) -L$(pwd)/rootfs/usr/lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/"

note the -L linker argument pointing to the absolute path of libx11 on the chroot/rootfs

2. install prerequisites for the target architecture:

scripts/npm.sh install --arch=armhf

3. create a .deb file for easy installation on the target device:

npm run gulp vscode-linux-arm-min
npm run gulp vscode-linux-arm-build-deb