Provided by: mono-devel_6.12.0.199+dfsg-6_all 
NAME
mkbundle, mkbundle2 - Creates a bundled executable.
SYNOPSIS
mkbundle [options] assembly1 [assembly2 ...]
DESCRIPTION
mkbundle generates an executable program that will contain static copies of the assemblies listed on the
command line. By default only the assemblies specified in the command line will be included in the
bundle. To automatically include all of the dependencies referenced, use the "--deps" command line
option.
There are two modes of operation, one uses an existing Mono binary or a server-hosted list of binaries
and is enabled when you use either the --cross, --sdk or the --runtime command line options.
An older mechanism creates a small C stub that links against the libmono library to produce a self-
contained executable and requires a C compiler. It is described in the "OLD EMBEDDING" section below.
For example, to create a bundle for hello world, use the following command:
$ mkbundle -o hello --simple hello.exe
You can configure options to be passed to the Mono runtime directly into your executable, for this, use
the --options flag. For example, the following disables inlining, by passing the "-O=-inline" command
line option to the embedded executable:
$ mkbundle -o hello --options -O=-inline --simple hello.exe
The simple version allows for cross-compiling, this requires a Mono
runtime to be installed in the ~/.mono/targets/TARGET/mono to be
available. You can use the "--local-targets" to list all available
targets, and the "--cross" argument to specify the target, like this:
$ mkbundle --local-targets
Available targets:
default - Current System Mono
4.4.0-macosx-x86
4.4.0-debian-8-arm64
$ mkbundle --cross 4.4.0-debian-8-powerpc hello.exe -o hello-debian
The above will bundle your native library into hello-debian for a Debian 8 system running on a PowerPC
machine.
We provide pre-packages binaries for Mono for various architectures, which allow you to cross compile,
use the --list-targets to get a list of all targets supported, and use the --fetch-target flag to
retrieve a target that you do not have installed, like this:
$ mkbundle --list-targets
Cross-compilation targets available:
4.4.0-linux-libc2.13-amd64
4.4.0-linux-libc2.13-armel
4.4.0-linux-libc2.13-armhf
4.4.0-linux-libc2.13-i386
4.4.0-macos-10.7-amd64
4.4.0-macos-10.7-i386
4.4.2-linux-libc2.13-amd64
4.4.2-linux-libc2.13-armel
4.4.2-linux-libc2.13-armhf
4.4.2-linux-libc2.13-i386
4.4.2-macos-10.7-amd64
4.4.2-macos-10.7-i386
$ mkbundle --fetch-target 4.4.2-macos-10.7-i386
And then you can produce a binary that will run on 32-bit Mono on MacOS:
$ mkbundle --cross 4.4.2-macos-10.7-i386 hello.exe -o hello-macos
Downloaded targets are stored ~/.mono/targets directory.
OPTIONS
--config FILE
Specifies that a DLLMAP Mono config file must be bundled as well. In the simple and cross
compiler modes, if no config file is specified the one for the current target is picked (either
the system one in the case of the simple mode, or the one that came from the cross compilation
target for the cross compiling mode).
--config-dir DIR
When passed, DIR will be set for the MONO_CFG_DIR environment variable
--cross target
Use this to request mkbundle generate a cross-compiled binary. It Creates a bundle for the
specified target platform. The target must be a directory in ~/.mono/targets/ that contains an
SDK installation as produced by the mono-package-runtime tool. You can get a list of the
precompiled versions of the runtime using --list-targets and you can fetch a specific target using
the --fetch-target command line option.
This flag is mutually exclusive with --sdk which is used to specify an absolute path to resolve
the Mono runtime from and the --runtime option which is used to manually construct the cross-
platform package.
--deps This option will bundle all of the referenced assemblies for the assemblies listed on the command
line option. This is useful to distribute a self-contained image.
--env KEY=VALUE
Use this to hardcode an environment variable at runtime for KEY to be mapped to VALUE. This is
useful in scenarios where you want to enable certain Mono runtime configuration options that are
controlled by environment variables.
--fetch-target target
Downloads a precompiled runtime for the specified target from the Mono distribution site.
--i18n encoding
Specified which encoding tables to ship with the executable. By default, Mono ships the
supporting I18N.dll assembly and the I18N.West.dll assembly. If your application will use the
System.Text.Encoding.GetEncoding with encodings other than the West encodings, you should specify
them here.
You can use the none parameter to request that no implicit encodings should be bundled, including
the supporting I18N.dll, use this option if you have ran a linker on your own.
You can use the all flag to bundle all available encodings.
Or you can use a comma delimited list of the workds CJK, MidWest, Other, Rare and West to
specificy which encoding assemblies to distribute.
-L path
Adds the `path' do the search list for assemblies. The rules are the same as for the compiler
-lib: or -L flags.
--library [LIB,]PATH
Embeds the dynamic library file pointed to by `PATH' and optionally give it the name `LIB' into
the bundled executable. This is used to ship native library dependencies that are unpacked at
startup and loaded from the runtime. Multiple libraries should be specified in dependency order,
where later ones on the command line depend on earlier ones.
--lists-targets
Lists all of the available local cross compilation targets available as precompiled binaries on
the Mono distribution server.
--local-targets
Lists all of the available local cross compilation targets.
--cil-strip PATH
Provides a CIL stripper that mkbundle will use if able to. The intended use is to help reduce
file size on AOT.
--in-tree path/to/mono/source/root
Provides mkbundle with a mono source repository from which to pull the necessary headers for
compilation. This allows mkbundle to run out of the project's source tree, useful for working
with multiple runtimes and for testing without installing.
--managed-linker PATH
Provides mkbundle access to a managed linker to preprocess the assemblies.
--machine-config FILE
Uses the given FILE as the machine.config file for the generated application. The machine config
contains an XML file that is used by System.Configuration APIs to configure the .NET stack.
Typically this is $prefix/etc/mono/4.5/machine.config.
If you want to disable this automatic bundling, you can use the --no-machine-config flag. In the
simple and cross compiler modes, if no machine.config file is specified the one for the current
target is picked (either the system one in the case of the simple mode, or the one that came from
the cross compilation target for the cross compiling mode).
--no-config
In simple or cross compiling mode, this prevents mkbundle from automatically bundling a config
file.
--nodeps
This is the default: mkbundle will only include the assemblies that were specified on the command
line to reduce the size of the resulting image created.
--no-machine-config
In simple or cross compiling mode, this prevents mkbundle from automatically bundling a
machine.config file.
-o filename
Places the output on `out'. If the flag -c is specified, this is the C host program. If not,
this contains the resulting executable.
--options OPTS
Since the resulting executable will be treated as a standalone program, you can use this option to
pass configuration options to the Mono runtime and bake those into the resulting executable.
These options are specified as OPTS.
You can use the above to configure options that you would typically pass on the command line to
Mono, before the main program is executed.
Additionally, users of your binary can still configure their own options by setting the
MONO_ENV_OPTIONS environment variable.
--sdk SDK_PATH
Use this flag to specify a path from which mkbundle will resolve the Mono SDK from. The SDK path
should be the prefix path that you used to configure a Mono installation. And would typically
contain files lik SDK_PATH/bin/mono , SDK_PATH/lib/mono/4.5 and so on.
When this flag is specified, mkbundle will resolve the runtime, the framework libraries, unmanaged
resources and configuration files from the files located in this directory.
This flag is mutually exlusive with --cross
--target-server SERVER
By default the mkbundle tool will download from a Mono server the target runtimes, you can specify
a different server to provide cross-compiled runtimes.
--mono-api-struct-path FILE
FILE points to a file with the definition of the BundleMonoAPI structure which contains the
required pointers to various Mono API functions used throughout the generated code. This mechanism
is meant to be used by third parties which embed the Mono runtime and dynamically load and
initialize it as part of the application startup, in which case the Mono APIs will not be
available for the shared library loader and the bundle will fail to work (one example of such an
embedding third party is Xamarin.Android).
After providing the definition FILE, the embedder must call the void initialize_mono_api (const
BundleMonoAPI *info) function found in the generated code before calling void mono_mkbundle_init
(). The structure passed to initialize_mono_api doesn't need to be dynamically allocated as its
contents is copied to the local structure in the generated code and no pointer to the passed
structure is retained or used after initialize_mono_api returns.
The list of pointers is not documented here. Instead, please look at the bundle-mono-api.inc file
found in the mkbundle source directory in your Mono source tree (mcs/tools/mkbundle) or in the
Mono's GitHub repository, https://github.com/mono/mono/blob/master/mcs/tools/mkbundle/bundle-mono-
api.inc
Please note that your structure must match the one expected by your version of the Mono runtime.
The file must also define the mkbundle_log_error function with the following signature:
static void mkbundle_log_error (const char *format, ...) {}
The function should implement logging API specific to the embedder.
OLD EMBEDDING
The old embedding system compiles a small C stub that embeds the C code and compiles the resulting
executable using the system compiler. This requires both a working C compiler installation and only
works to bundle binaries for the current host.
The feature is still available, but we recommend the simpler, faster and more convenient new mode.
For example, to create a bundle for hello world, use the following command:
$ mkbundle -o hello hello.exe
The above will pull hello.exe into a native program called "hello". Notice that the produced image still
contains the CIL image and no precompilation is done.
In addition, it is possible to control whether mkbundle should compile the resulting executable or not
with the -c option. This is useful if you want to link additional libraries or control the generated
output in more detail. For example, this could be used to link some libraries statically:
$ mkbundle -c -o host.c -oo bundles.o --deps hello.exe
$ cc host.c bundles.o /usr/lib/libmono.a -lc -lrt
You may also use mkbundle to generate a bundle you can use when embedding the Mono runtime in a native
application. In that case, use both the -c and --nomain options. The resulting host.c file will not
have a main() function. Call mono_mkbundle_init() before initializing the JIT in your code so that the
bundled assemblies are available to the embedded runtime.
OLD EMBEDDING OPTIONS
These options can only be used instead of using the --cross, --runtime or --simple options.
-c Produce the stub file, do not compile the resulting stub.
-oo filename
Specifies the name to be used for the helper object file that contains the bundle.
--keeptemp
By default mkbundle will delete the temporary files that it uses to produce the bundle. This
option keeps the file around.
--nomain
With the -c option, generate the host stub without a main() function.
--static
By default mkbundle dynamically links to mono and glib. This option causes it to statically link
instead.
-z Compresses the assemblies before embedding. This results in smaller executable files, but
increases startup time and requires zlib to be installed on the target system.
AOT Options
These options support an mkbundle using AOT compilation with static linking. A native compiler toolchain
is required.
--aot-runtime PATH
Provide the path to the mono runtime to use for AOTing assemblies.
--aot-dedup
(Experimental) Deduplicate AOT'ed methods based on a unique mangling of method names.
--aot-mode MODE
MODE can be either "full" or "llvmonly" at this time. Currently, mkbundle supports three AOT
modes. The default mode (this option unset) will AOT methods but will fall back on runtime codegen
where it is much faster or offers a more full compatibility profile. The "full" setting will
generate the necessary stubs to not require runtime code generation. The "llvmonly" setting does
the same, but forces all codegen to go through the llvm backend.
WINDOWS
If you are using the old embedding on Windows systems, it possible to use a Unix-like toolchain like
cygwin's and install gcc, gcc-mingw packages or use Visual Studio 2015/2017 VC toolchain together with
Clang for Visual Studio as assembler. Clang can be installed as an individual component, "Clang/C2",
using Visual Studio installer.
Using Visual Studio toolchain, mkbundle will, by default, use latest installed Visual Studio compiler and
linker as well as Windows SDK. If executed from one of the Visual Studio developer command prompts,
mkbundle will retrieve information directly from that build environment.
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
AS Assembler command. The default is "as". For Visual Studio, default is "clang.exe". If "clang.exe"
for Visual Studio is not installed, mkbundle will fall back using "as".
CC C compiler command. The default is "cc" for Linux, "gcc" for cygwin and "cl.exe" for Visual
Studio.
MONO_BUNDLED_OPTIONS
Options to be passed to the bundled Mono runtime, separated by spaces. See the mono(1) manual page
or run mono --help.
WINDOWS VISUAL STUDIO ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
VisualStudioVersion
Visual Studio version used in mkbundle build. Default, latest installed Visual Studio version.
Values, "14.0" for Visual Studio 2015 or "15.0" for Visual Studio 2017.
WindowsSdkVersion
Windows SDK version used in mkbundle build. Default/unknown, latest installed Windows SDK.
Values, "8.1", "10.0.10240.0", "10.0.15063.0" etc.
VSCMD_ARG_TGT_ARCH
Output target architecture used in mkbundle build. Default/unknown, use architecture of .NET
runtime executing mkbundle. Values, "x86" or "x64". NOTE, when running from a Visual Studio
command prompt, this variable should already be set by the command prompt and match the rest of
that build environment.
INCLUDE
Override all custom include paths passed to "cl.exe". Predefined by Visual Studio developer
command prompt or auto detected by mkbundle when undefined.
LIB Override all custom library paths passed to "link.exe". Predefined by Visual Studio developer
command prompt or auto detected by mkbundle when undefined.
MONOPREFIX
Use a custom Mono SDK install root matching the output target architecture (x86/x64). Default,
mkbundle will look for installed Mono SDK’s matching targeted architecture.
MONOLIB
Use a different mono library name or an absolute path to the mono library passed to linker.
Default, mkbundle will use default mono library name depending on mkbundle dynamic/static use
case. NOTE, supplied mono library needs to match mkbundle dynamic/static use case and target
architecture.
VCCRT Override C-runtime library linker settings. Default "MD", mkbundle will use dynamic C-runtime
linking on Windows compatible with Mono SDK distribution. If a custom built Mono runtime using
static C-Runtime linkage is used, setting this variable to "MT" will link using static C-runtime
libraries.
VCSUBSYSTEM
Override Windows subsystem. Default, "windows". If console subsystem is preferred, use "console".
NOTE, if console output is expected from output target process then set this variable to
"console".
FILES
This program will load referenced assemblies from the Mono assembly cache.
Targets are loaded from ~/.mono/targets/TARGETNAME/mono
BUGS
MAILING LISTS
Visit http://lists.ximian.com/mailman/listinfo/mono-devel-list for details.
WEB SITE
Visit: http://www.mono-project.com for details
SEE ALSO
mcs(1),mono(1),mono-config(5).
Mono(mkbundle)