1====================== 2Legacy GPIO Interfaces 3====================== 4 5This provides an overview of GPIO access conventions on Linux. 6 7These calls use the gpio_* naming prefix. No other calls should use that 8prefix, or the related __gpio_* prefix. 9 10 11What is a GPIO? 12=============== 13A "General Purpose Input/Output" (GPIO) is a flexible software-controlled 14digital signal. They are provided from many kinds of chip, and are familiar 15to Linux developers working with embedded and custom hardware. Each GPIO 16represents a bit connected to a particular pin, or "ball" on Ball Grid Array 17(BGA) packages. Board schematics show which external hardware connects to 18which GPIOs. Drivers can be written generically, so that board setup code 19passes such pin configuration data to drivers. 20 21System-on-Chip (SOC) processors heavily rely on GPIOs. In some cases, every 22non-dedicated pin can be configured as a GPIO; and most chips have at least 23several dozen of them. Programmable logic devices (like FPGAs) can easily 24provide GPIOs; multifunction chips like power managers, and audio codecs 25often have a few such pins to help with pin scarcity on SOCs; and there are 26also "GPIO Expander" chips that connect using the I2C or SPI serial busses. 27Most PC southbridges have a few dozen GPIO-capable pins (with only the BIOS 28firmware knowing how they're used). 29 30The exact capabilities of GPIOs vary between systems. Common options: 31 32 - Output values are writable (high=1, low=0). Some chips also have 33 options about how that value is driven, so that for example only one 34 value might be driven ... supporting "wire-OR" and similar schemes 35 for the other value (notably, "open drain" signaling). 36 37 - Input values are likewise readable (1, 0). Some chips support readback 38 of pins configured as "output", which is very useful in such "wire-OR" 39 cases (to support bidirectional signaling). GPIO controllers may have 40 input de-glitch/debounce logic, sometimes with software controls. 41 42 - Inputs can often be used as IRQ signals, often edge triggered but 43 sometimes level triggered. Such IRQs may be configurable as system 44 wakeup events, to wake the system from a low power state. 45 46 - Usually a GPIO will be configurable as either input or output, as needed 47 by different product boards; single direction ones exist too. 48 49 - Most GPIOs can be accessed while holding spinlocks, but those accessed 50 through a serial bus normally can't. Some systems support both types. 51 52On a given board each GPIO is used for one specific purpose like monitoring 53MMC/SD card insertion/removal, detecting card writeprotect status, driving 54a LED, configuring a transceiver, bitbanging a serial bus, poking a hardware 55watchdog, sensing a switch, and so on. 56 57 58GPIO conventions 59================ 60Note that this is called a "convention" because you don't need to do it this 61way, and it's no crime if you don't. There **are** cases where portability 62is not the main issue; GPIOs are often used for the kind of board-specific 63glue logic that may even change between board revisions, and can't ever be 64used on a board that's wired differently. Only least-common-denominator 65functionality can be very portable. Other features are platform-specific, 66and that can be critical for glue logic. 67 68Plus, this doesn't require any implementation framework, just an interface. 69One platform might implement it as simple inline functions accessing chip 70registers; another might implement it by delegating through abstractions 71used for several very different kinds of GPIO controller. (There is some 72optional code supporting such an implementation strategy, described later 73in this document, but drivers acting as clients to the GPIO interface must 74not care how it's implemented.) 75 76That said, if the convention is supported on their platform, drivers should 77use it when possible. Platforms must select GPIOLIB if GPIO functionality 78is strictly required. Drivers that can't work without 79standard GPIO calls should have Kconfig entries which depend on GPIOLIB. The 80GPIO calls are available, either as "real code" or as optimized-away stubs, 81when drivers use the include file: 82 83 #include <linux/gpio.h> 84 85If you stick to this convention then it'll be easier for other developers to 86see what your code is doing, and help maintain it. 87 88Note that these operations include I/O barriers on platforms which need to 89use them; drivers don't need to add them explicitly. 90 91 92Identifying GPIOs 93----------------- 94GPIOs are identified by unsigned integers in the range 0..MAX_INT. That 95reserves "negative" numbers for other purposes like marking signals as 96"not available on this board", or indicating faults. Code that doesn't 97touch the underlying hardware treats these integers as opaque cookies. 98 99Platforms define how they use those integers, and usually #define symbols 100for the GPIO lines so that board-specific setup code directly corresponds 101to the relevant schematics. In contrast, drivers should only use GPIO 102numbers passed to them from that setup code, using platform_data to hold 103board-specific pin configuration data (along with other board specific 104data they need). That avoids portability problems. 105 106So for example one platform uses numbers 32-159 for GPIOs; while another 107uses numbers 0..63 with one set of GPIO controllers, 64-79 with another 108type of GPIO controller, and on one particular board 80-95 with an FPGA. 109The numbers need not be contiguous; either of those platforms could also 110use numbers 2000-2063 to identify GPIOs in a bank of I2C GPIO expanders. 111 112If you want to initialize a structure with an invalid GPIO number, use 113some negative number (perhaps "-EINVAL"); that will never be valid. To 114test if such number from such a structure could reference a GPIO, you 115may use this predicate: 116 117 int gpio_is_valid(int number); 118 119A number that's not valid will be rejected by calls which may request 120or free GPIOs (see below). Other numbers may also be rejected; for 121example, a number might be valid but temporarily unused on a given board. 122 123Whether a platform supports multiple GPIO controllers is a platform-specific 124implementation issue, as are whether that support can leave "holes" in the space 125of GPIO numbers, and whether new controllers can be added at runtime. Such issues 126can affect things including whether adjacent GPIO numbers are both valid. 127 128Using GPIOs 129----------- 130The first thing a system should do with a GPIO is allocate it, using 131the gpio_request() call; see later. 132 133One of the next things to do with a GPIO, often in board setup code when 134setting up a platform_device using the GPIO, is mark its direction:: 135 136 /* set as input or output, returning 0 or negative errno */ 137 int gpio_direction_input(unsigned gpio); 138 int gpio_direction_output(unsigned gpio, int value); 139 140The return value is zero for success, else a negative errno. It should 141be checked, since the get/set calls don't have error returns and since 142misconfiguration is possible. You should normally issue these calls from 143a task context. However, for spinlock-safe GPIOs it's OK to use them 144before tasking is enabled, as part of early board setup. 145 146For output GPIOs, the value provided becomes the initial output value. 147This helps avoid signal glitching during system startup. 148 149For compatibility with legacy interfaces to GPIOs, setting the direction 150of a GPIO implicitly requests that GPIO (see below) if it has not been 151requested already. That compatibility is being removed from the optional 152gpiolib framework. 153 154Setting the direction can fail if the GPIO number is invalid, or when 155that particular GPIO can't be used in that mode. It's generally a bad 156idea to rely on boot firmware to have set the direction correctly, since 157it probably wasn't validated to do more than boot Linux. (Similarly, 158that board setup code probably needs to multiplex that pin as a GPIO, 159and configure pullups/pulldowns appropriately.) 160 161 162Spinlock-Safe GPIO access 163------------------------- 164Most GPIO controllers can be accessed with memory read/write instructions. 165Those don't need to sleep, and can safely be done from inside hard 166(nonthreaded) IRQ handlers and similar contexts. 167 168Use the following calls to access such GPIOs:: 169 170 /* GPIO INPUT: return zero or nonzero */ 171 int gpio_get_value(unsigned gpio); 172 173 /* GPIO OUTPUT */ 174 void gpio_set_value(unsigned gpio, int value); 175 176The values are boolean, zero for low, nonzero for high. When reading the 177value of an output pin, the value returned should be what's seen on the 178pin ... that won't always match the specified output value, because of 179issues including open-drain signaling and output latencies. 180 181The get/set calls have no error returns because "invalid GPIO" should have 182been reported earlier from gpio_direction_*(). However, note that not all 183platforms can read the value of output pins; those that can't should always 184return zero. Also, using these calls for GPIOs that can't safely be accessed 185without sleeping (see below) is an error. 186 187Platform-specific implementations are encouraged to optimize the two 188calls to access the GPIO value in cases where the GPIO number (and for 189output, value) are constant. It's normal for them to need only a couple 190of instructions in such cases (reading or writing a hardware register), 191and not to need spinlocks. Such optimized calls can make bitbanging 192applications a lot more efficient (in both space and time) than spending 193dozens of instructions on subroutine calls. 194 195 196GPIO access that may sleep 197-------------------------- 198Some GPIO controllers must be accessed using message based busses like I2C 199or SPI. Commands to read or write those GPIO values require waiting to 200get to the head of a queue to transmit a command and get its response. 201This requires sleeping, which can't be done from inside IRQ handlers. 202To access such GPIOs, a different set of accessors is defined:: 203 204 /* GPIO INPUT: return zero or nonzero, might sleep */ 205 int gpio_get_value_cansleep(unsigned gpio); 206 207 /* GPIO OUTPUT, might sleep */ 208 void gpio_set_value_cansleep(unsigned gpio, int value); 209 210Accessing such GPIOs requires a context which may sleep, for example 211a threaded IRQ handler, and those accessors must be used instead of 212spinlock-safe accessors without the cansleep() name suffix. 213 214Other than the fact that these accessors might sleep, and will work 215on GPIOs that can't be accessed from hardIRQ handlers, these calls act 216the same as the spinlock-safe calls. 217 218**IN ADDITION** calls to setup and configure such GPIOs must be made 219from contexts which may sleep, since they may need to access the GPIO 220controller chip too (These setup calls are usually made from board 221setup or driver probe/teardown code, so this is an easy constraint.):: 222 223 gpio_direction_input() 224 gpio_direction_output() 225 gpio_request() 226 227 ## gpio_request_one() 228 ## gpio_request_array() 229 ## gpio_free_array() 230 231 gpio_free() 232 233 234Claiming and Releasing GPIOs 235---------------------------- 236To help catch system configuration errors, two calls are defined:: 237 238 /* request GPIO, returning 0 or negative errno. 239 * non-null labels may be useful for diagnostics. 240 */ 241 int gpio_request(unsigned gpio, const char *label); 242 243 /* release previously-claimed GPIO */ 244 void gpio_free(unsigned gpio); 245 246Passing invalid GPIO numbers to gpio_request() will fail, as will requesting 247GPIOs that have already been claimed with that call. The return value of 248gpio_request() must be checked. You should normally issue these calls from 249a task context. However, for spinlock-safe GPIOs it's OK to request GPIOs 250before tasking is enabled, as part of early board setup. 251 252These calls serve two basic purposes. One is marking the signals which 253are actually in use as GPIOs, for better diagnostics; systems may have 254several hundred potential GPIOs, but often only a dozen are used on any 255given board. Another is to catch conflicts, identifying errors when 256(a) two or more drivers wrongly think they have exclusive use of that 257signal, or (b) something wrongly believes it's safe to remove drivers 258needed to manage a signal that's in active use. That is, requesting a 259GPIO can serve as a kind of lock. 260 261Some platforms may also use knowledge about what GPIOs are active for 262power management, such as by powering down unused chip sectors and, more 263easily, gating off unused clocks. 264 265For GPIOs that use pins known to the pinctrl subsystem, that subsystem should 266be informed of their use; a gpiolib driver's .request() operation may call 267pinctrl_gpio_request(), and a gpiolib driver's .free() operation may call 268pinctrl_gpio_free(). The pinctrl subsystem allows a pinctrl_gpio_request() 269to succeed concurrently with a pin or pingroup being "owned" by a device for 270pin multiplexing. 271 272Any programming of pin multiplexing hardware that is needed to route the 273GPIO signal to the appropriate pin should occur within a GPIO driver's 274.direction_input() or .direction_output() operations, and occur after any 275setup of an output GPIO's value. This allows a glitch-free migration from a 276pin's special function to GPIO. This is sometimes required when using a GPIO 277to implement a workaround on signals typically driven by a non-GPIO HW block. 278 279Some platforms allow some or all GPIO signals to be routed to different pins. 280Similarly, other aspects of the GPIO or pin may need to be configured, such as 281pullup/pulldown. Platform software should arrange that any such details are 282configured prior to gpio_request() being called for those GPIOs, e.g. using 283the pinctrl subsystem's mapping table, so that GPIO users need not be aware 284of these details. 285 286Also note that it's your responsibility to have stopped using a GPIO 287before you free it. 288 289Considering in most cases GPIOs are actually configured right after they 290are claimed, three additional calls are defined:: 291 292 /* request a single GPIO, with initial configuration specified by 293 * 'flags', identical to gpio_request() wrt other arguments and 294 * return value 295 */ 296 int gpio_request_one(unsigned gpio, unsigned long flags, const char *label); 297 298 /* request multiple GPIOs in a single call 299 */ 300 int gpio_request_array(struct gpio *array, size_t num); 301 302 /* release multiple GPIOs in a single call 303 */ 304 void gpio_free_array(struct gpio *array, size_t num); 305 306where 'flags' is currently defined to specify the following properties: 307 308 * GPIOF_DIR_IN - to configure direction as input 309 * GPIOF_DIR_OUT - to configure direction as output 310 311 * GPIOF_INIT_LOW - as output, set initial level to LOW 312 * GPIOF_INIT_HIGH - as output, set initial level to HIGH 313 314since GPIOF_INIT_* are only valid when configured as output, so group valid 315combinations as: 316 317 * GPIOF_IN - configure as input 318 * GPIOF_OUT_INIT_LOW - configured as output, initial level LOW 319 * GPIOF_OUT_INIT_HIGH - configured as output, initial level HIGH 320 321Further more, to ease the claim/release of multiple GPIOs, 'struct gpio' is 322introduced to encapsulate all three fields as:: 323 324 struct gpio { 325 unsigned gpio; 326 unsigned long flags; 327 const char *label; 328 }; 329 330A typical example of usage:: 331 332 static struct gpio leds_gpios[] = { 333 { 32, GPIOF_OUT_INIT_HIGH, "Power LED" }, /* default to ON */ 334 { 33, GPIOF_OUT_INIT_LOW, "Green LED" }, /* default to OFF */ 335 { 34, GPIOF_OUT_INIT_LOW, "Red LED" }, /* default to OFF */ 336 { 35, GPIOF_OUT_INIT_LOW, "Blue LED" }, /* default to OFF */ 337 { ... }, 338 }; 339 340 err = gpio_request_one(31, GPIOF_IN, "Reset Button"); 341 if (err) 342 ... 343 344 err = gpio_request_array(leds_gpios, ARRAY_SIZE(leds_gpios)); 345 if (err) 346 ... 347 348 gpio_free_array(leds_gpios, ARRAY_SIZE(leds_gpios)); 349 350 351GPIOs mapped to IRQs 352-------------------- 353GPIO numbers are unsigned integers; so are IRQ numbers. These make up 354two logically distinct namespaces (GPIO 0 need not use IRQ 0). You can 355map between them using calls like:: 356 357 /* map GPIO numbers to IRQ numbers */ 358 int gpio_to_irq(unsigned gpio); 359 360Those return either the corresponding number in the other namespace, or 361else a negative errno code if the mapping can't be done. (For example, 362some GPIOs can't be used as IRQs.) It is an unchecked error to use a GPIO 363number that wasn't set up as an input using gpio_direction_input(), or 364to use an IRQ number that didn't originally come from gpio_to_irq(). 365 366These two mapping calls are expected to cost on the order of a single 367addition or subtraction. They're not allowed to sleep. 368 369Non-error values returned from gpio_to_irq() can be passed to request_irq() 370or free_irq(). They will often be stored into IRQ resources for platform 371devices, by the board-specific initialization code. Note that IRQ trigger 372options are part of the IRQ interface, e.g. IRQF_TRIGGER_FALLING, as are 373system wakeup capabilities. 374 375 376Emulating Open Drain Signals 377---------------------------- 378Sometimes shared signals need to use "open drain" signaling, where only the 379low signal level is actually driven. (That term applies to CMOS transistors; 380"open collector" is used for TTL.) A pullup resistor causes the high signal 381level. This is sometimes called a "wire-AND"; or more practically, from the 382negative logic (low=true) perspective this is a "wire-OR". 383 384One common example of an open drain signal is a shared active-low IRQ line. 385Also, bidirectional data bus signals sometimes use open drain signals. 386 387Some GPIO controllers directly support open drain outputs; many don't. When 388you need open drain signaling but your hardware doesn't directly support it, 389there's a common idiom you can use to emulate it with any GPIO pin that can 390be used as either an input or an output: 391 392 LOW: gpio_direction_output(gpio, 0) ... this drives the signal 393 and overrides the pullup. 394 395 HIGH: gpio_direction_input(gpio) ... this turns off the output, 396 so the pullup (or some other device) controls the signal. 397 398If you are "driving" the signal high but gpio_get_value(gpio) reports a low 399value (after the appropriate rise time passes), you know some other component 400is driving the shared signal low. That's not necessarily an error. As one 401common example, that's how I2C clocks are stretched: a slave that needs a 402slower clock delays the rising edge of SCK, and the I2C master adjusts its 403signaling rate accordingly. 404 405 406GPIO controllers and the pinctrl subsystem 407------------------------------------------ 408 409A GPIO controller on a SOC might be tightly coupled with the pinctrl 410subsystem, in the sense that the pins can be used by other functions 411together with an optional gpio feature. We have already covered the 412case where e.g. a GPIO controller need to reserve a pin or set the 413direction of a pin by calling any of:: 414 415 pinctrl_gpio_request() 416 pinctrl_gpio_free() 417 pinctrl_gpio_direction_input() 418 pinctrl_gpio_direction_output() 419 420But how does the pin control subsystem cross-correlate the GPIO 421numbers (which are a global business) to a certain pin on a certain 422pin controller? 423 424This is done by registering "ranges" of pins, which are essentially 425cross-reference tables. These are described in 426Documentation/driver-api/pin-control.rst 427 428While the pin allocation is totally managed by the pinctrl subsystem, 429gpio (under gpiolib) is still maintained by gpio drivers. It may happen 430that different pin ranges in a SoC is managed by different gpio drivers. 431 432This makes it logical to let gpio drivers announce their pin ranges to 433the pin ctrl subsystem before it will call 'pinctrl_gpio_request' in order 434to request the corresponding pin to be prepared by the pinctrl subsystem 435before any gpio usage. 436 437For this, the gpio controller can register its pin range with pinctrl 438subsystem. There are two ways of doing it currently: with or without DT. 439 440For with DT support refer to Documentation/devicetree/bindings/gpio/gpio.txt. 441 442For non-DT support, user can call gpiochip_add_pin_range() with appropriate 443parameters to register a range of gpio pins with a pinctrl driver. For this 444exact name string of pinctrl device has to be passed as one of the 445argument to this routine. 446 447 448What do these conventions omit? 449=============================== 450One of the biggest things these conventions omit is pin multiplexing, since 451this is highly chip-specific and nonportable. One platform might not need 452explicit multiplexing; another might have just two options for use of any 453given pin; another might have eight options per pin; another might be able 454to route a given GPIO to any one of several pins. (Yes, those examples all 455come from systems that run Linux today.) 456 457Related to multiplexing is configuration and enabling of the pullups or 458pulldowns integrated on some platforms. Not all platforms support them, 459or support them in the same way; and any given board might use external 460pullups (or pulldowns) so that the on-chip ones should not be used. 461(When a circuit needs 5 kOhm, on-chip 100 kOhm resistors won't do.) 462Likewise drive strength (2 mA vs 20 mA) and voltage (1.8V vs 3.3V) is a 463platform-specific issue, as are models like (not) having a one-to-one 464correspondence between configurable pins and GPIOs. 465 466There are other system-specific mechanisms that are not specified here, 467like the aforementioned options for input de-glitching and wire-OR output. 468Hardware may support reading or writing GPIOs in gangs, but that's usually 469configuration dependent: for GPIOs sharing the same bank. (GPIOs are 470commonly grouped in banks of 16 or 32, with a given SOC having several such 471banks.) Some systems can trigger IRQs from output GPIOs, or read values 472from pins not managed as GPIOs. Code relying on such mechanisms will 473necessarily be nonportable. 474 475Dynamic definition of GPIOs is not currently standard; for example, as 476a side effect of configuring an add-on board with some GPIO expanders. 477 478 479GPIO implementor's framework (OPTIONAL) 480======================================= 481As noted earlier, there is an optional implementation framework making it 482easier for platforms to support different kinds of GPIO controller using 483the same programming interface. This framework is called "gpiolib". 484 485As a debugging aid, if debugfs is available a /sys/kernel/debug/gpio file 486will be found there. That will list all the controllers registered through 487this framework, and the state of the GPIOs currently in use. 488 489 490Controller Drivers: gpio_chip 491----------------------------- 492In this framework each GPIO controller is packaged as a "struct gpio_chip" 493with information common to each controller of that type: 494 495 - methods to establish GPIO direction 496 - methods used to access GPIO values 497 - flag saying whether calls to its methods may sleep 498 - optional debugfs dump method (showing extra state like pullup config) 499 - label for diagnostics 500 501There is also per-instance data, which may come from device.platform_data: 502the number of its first GPIO, and how many GPIOs it exposes. 503 504The code implementing a gpio_chip should support multiple instances of the 505controller, possibly using the driver model. That code will configure each 506gpio_chip and issue gpiochip_add(). Removing a GPIO controller should be 507rare; use gpiochip_remove() when it is unavoidable. 508 509Most often a gpio_chip is part of an instance-specific structure with state 510not exposed by the GPIO interfaces, such as addressing, power management, 511and more. Chips such as codecs will have complex non-GPIO state. 512 513Any debugfs dump method should normally ignore signals which haven't been 514requested as GPIOs. They can use gpiochip_is_requested(), which returns 515either NULL or the label associated with that GPIO when it was requested. 516 517 518Platform Support 519---------------- 520To force-enable this framework, a platform's Kconfig will "select" GPIOLIB, 521else it is up to the user to configure support for GPIO. 522 523If neither of these options are selected, the platform does not support 524GPIOs through GPIO-lib and the code cannot be enabled by the user. 525 526Trivial implementations of those functions can directly use framework 527code, which always dispatches through the gpio_chip:: 528 529 #define gpio_get_value __gpio_get_value 530 #define gpio_set_value __gpio_set_value 531 532Fancier implementations could instead define those as inline functions with 533logic optimizing access to specific SOC-based GPIOs. For example, if the 534referenced GPIO is the constant "12", getting or setting its value could 535cost as little as two or three instructions, never sleeping. When such an 536optimization is not possible those calls must delegate to the framework 537code, costing at least a few dozen instructions. For bitbanged I/O, such 538instruction savings can be significant. 539 540For SOCs, platform-specific code defines and registers gpio_chip instances 541for each bank of on-chip GPIOs. Those GPIOs should be numbered/labeled to 542match chip vendor documentation, and directly match board schematics. They 543may well start at zero and go up to a platform-specific limit. Such GPIOs 544are normally integrated into platform initialization to make them always be 545available, from arch_initcall() or earlier; they can often serve as IRQs. 546 547 548Board Support 549------------- 550For external GPIO controllers -- such as I2C or SPI expanders, ASICs, multi 551function devices, FPGAs or CPLDs -- most often board-specific code handles 552registering controller devices and ensures that their drivers know what GPIO 553numbers to use with gpiochip_add(). Their numbers often start right after 554platform-specific GPIOs. 555 556For example, board setup code could create structures identifying the range 557of GPIOs that chip will expose, and passes them to each GPIO expander chip 558using platform_data. Then the chip driver's probe() routine could pass that 559data to gpiochip_add(). 560 561Initialization order can be important. For example, when a device relies on 562an I2C-based GPIO, its probe() routine should only be called after that GPIO 563becomes available. That may mean the device should not be registered until 564calls for that GPIO can work. One way to address such dependencies is for 565such gpio_chip controllers to provide setup() and teardown() callbacks to 566board specific code; those board specific callbacks would register devices 567once all the necessary resources are available, and remove them later when 568the GPIO controller device becomes unavailable. 569 570 571Sysfs Interface for Userspace (OPTIONAL) 572======================================== 573Platforms which use the "gpiolib" implementors framework may choose to 574configure a sysfs user interface to GPIOs. This is different from the 575debugfs interface, since it provides control over GPIO direction and 576value instead of just showing a gpio state summary. Plus, it could be 577present on production systems without debugging support. 578 579Given appropriate hardware documentation for the system, userspace could 580know for example that GPIO #23 controls the write protect line used to 581protect boot loader segments in flash memory. System upgrade procedures 582may need to temporarily remove that protection, first importing a GPIO, 583then changing its output state, then updating the code before re-enabling 584the write protection. In normal use, GPIO #23 would never be touched, 585and the kernel would have no need to know about it. 586 587Again depending on appropriate hardware documentation, on some systems 588userspace GPIO can be used to determine system configuration data that 589standard kernels won't know about. And for some tasks, simple userspace 590GPIO drivers could be all that the system really needs. 591 592Note that standard kernel drivers exist for common "LEDs and Buttons" 593GPIO tasks: "leds-gpio" and "gpio_keys", respectively. Use those 594instead of talking directly to the GPIOs; they integrate with kernel 595frameworks better than your userspace code could. 596 597 598Paths in Sysfs 599-------------- 600There are three kinds of entry in /sys/class/gpio: 601 602 - Control interfaces used to get userspace control over GPIOs; 603 604 - GPIOs themselves; and 605 606 - GPIO controllers ("gpio_chip" instances). 607 608That's in addition to standard files including the "device" symlink. 609 610The control interfaces are write-only: 611 612 /sys/class/gpio/ 613 614 "export" ... Userspace may ask the kernel to export control of 615 a GPIO to userspace by writing its number to this file. 616 617 Example: "echo 19 > export" will create a "gpio19" node 618 for GPIO #19, if that's not requested by kernel code. 619 620 "unexport" ... Reverses the effect of exporting to userspace. 621 622 Example: "echo 19 > unexport" will remove a "gpio19" 623 node exported using the "export" file. 624 625GPIO signals have paths like /sys/class/gpio/gpio42/ (for GPIO #42) 626and have the following read/write attributes: 627 628 /sys/class/gpio/gpioN/ 629 630 "direction" ... reads as either "in" or "out". This value may 631 normally be written. Writing as "out" defaults to 632 initializing the value as low. To ensure glitch free 633 operation, values "low" and "high" may be written to 634 configure the GPIO as an output with that initial value. 635 636 Note that this attribute *will not exist* if the kernel 637 doesn't support changing the direction of a GPIO, or 638 it was exported by kernel code that didn't explicitly 639 allow userspace to reconfigure this GPIO's direction. 640 641 "value" ... reads as either 0 (low) or 1 (high). If the GPIO 642 is configured as an output, this value may be written; 643 any nonzero value is treated as high. 644 645 If the pin can be configured as interrupt-generating interrupt 646 and if it has been configured to generate interrupts (see the 647 description of "edge"), you can poll(2) on that file and 648 poll(2) will return whenever the interrupt was triggered. If 649 you use poll(2), set the events POLLPRI. If you use select(2), 650 set the file descriptor in exceptfds. After poll(2) returns, 651 either lseek(2) to the beginning of the sysfs file and read the 652 new value or close the file and re-open it to read the value. 653 654 "edge" ... reads as either "none", "rising", "falling", or 655 "both". Write these strings to select the signal edge(s) 656 that will make poll(2) on the "value" file return. 657 658 This file exists only if the pin can be configured as an 659 interrupt generating input pin. 660 661 "active_low" ... reads as either 0 (false) or 1 (true). Write 662 any nonzero value to invert the value attribute both 663 for reading and writing. Existing and subsequent 664 poll(2) support configuration via the edge attribute 665 for "rising" and "falling" edges will follow this 666 setting. 667 668GPIO controllers have paths like /sys/class/gpio/gpiochip42/ (for the 669controller implementing GPIOs starting at #42) and have the following 670read-only attributes: 671 672 /sys/class/gpio/gpiochipN/ 673 674 "base" ... same as N, the first GPIO managed by this chip 675 676 "label" ... provided for diagnostics (not always unique) 677 678 "ngpio" ... how many GPIOs this manges (N to N + ngpio - 1) 679 680Board documentation should in most cases cover what GPIOs are used for 681what purposes. However, those numbers are not always stable; GPIOs on 682a daughtercard might be different depending on the base board being used, 683or other cards in the stack. In such cases, you may need to use the 684gpiochip nodes (possibly in conjunction with schematics) to determine 685the correct GPIO number to use for a given signal. 686 687 688API Reference 689============= 690 691The functions listed in this section are deprecated. The GPIO descriptor based 692API should be used in new code. 693 694.. kernel-doc:: drivers/gpio/gpiolib-legacy.c 695 :export: 696