< Back to index

---

A Standard Build Unit is a term coined in Linux From Scratch, and it represents the amount of time required to build the GNU binutils package on a given computer. It is used as a reference to estimate the amount of time necessary to build a package.

For instance, if on a given computer the binutils package was built in 10 minutes, another package estimated to build in 0.5 SBUs would require 5 minutes to build on the same computer and under the same conditions.

The binutils package is larger than most packages usually available with a Linux distribution. As such, most build times are subunitary SBUs. Among the notable exceptions are: Linux kernel, gcc, KDE.

Note: although its name contains the terms "standard" and "unit", the notion is neither. It is merely an approximation of how long one should expect for a package to build. The actual build time is heavily influenced by the load of the machine (i.e. other processes), the number of processors (i.e. SMP), etc.

---

This entry uses material from from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. Disclaimer.