1 The Linux Hardware Monitoring kernel API
2 ========================================
9 This document describes the API that can be used by hardware monitoring
10 drivers that want to use the hardware monitoring framework.
12 This document does not describe what a hardware monitoring (hwmon) Driver or
13 Device is. It also does not describe the API which can be used by user space
14 to communicate with a hardware monitoring device. If you want to know this
15 then please read the following file: Documentation/hwmon/sysfs-interface.rst.
17 For additional guidelines on how to write and improve hwmon drivers, please
18 also read Documentation/hwmon/submitting-patches.rst.
22 Each hardware monitoring driver must #include <linux/hwmon.h> and, in most
23 cases, <linux/hwmon-sysfs.h>. linux/hwmon.h declares the following
24 register/unregister functions::
27 hwmon_device_register_with_groups(struct device *dev, const char *name,
29 const struct attribute_group **groups);
32 devm_hwmon_device_register_with_groups(struct device *dev,
33 const char *name, void *drvdata,
34 const struct attribute_group **groups);
37 hwmon_device_register_with_info(struct device *dev,
38 const char *name, void *drvdata,
39 const struct hwmon_chip_info *info,
40 const struct attribute_group **extra_groups);
43 devm_hwmon_device_register_with_info(struct device *dev,
46 const struct hwmon_chip_info *info,
47 const struct attribute_group **extra_groups);
49 void hwmon_device_unregister(struct device *dev);
51 void devm_hwmon_device_unregister(struct device *dev);
53 hwmon_device_register_with_groups registers a hardware monitoring device.
54 The first parameter of this function is a pointer to the parent device.
55 The name parameter is a pointer to the hwmon device name. The registration
56 function wil create a name sysfs attribute pointing to this name.
57 The drvdata parameter is the pointer to the local driver data.
58 hwmon_device_register_with_groups will attach this pointer to the newly
59 allocated hwmon device. The pointer can be retrieved by the driver using
60 dev_get_drvdata() on the hwmon device pointer. The groups parameter is
61 a pointer to a list of sysfs attribute groups. The list must be NULL terminated.
62 hwmon_device_register_with_groups creates the hwmon device with name attribute
63 as well as all sysfs attributes attached to the hwmon device.
64 This function returns a pointer to the newly created hardware monitoring device
65 or PTR_ERR for failure.
67 devm_hwmon_device_register_with_groups is similar to
68 hwmon_device_register_with_groups. However, it is device managed, meaning the
69 hwmon device does not have to be removed explicitly by the removal function.
71 hwmon_device_register_with_info is the most comprehensive and preferred means
72 to register a hardware monitoring device. It creates the standard sysfs
73 attributes in the hardware monitoring core, letting the driver focus on reading
74 from and writing to the chip instead of having to bother with sysfs attributes.
75 The parent device parameter cannot be NULL with non-NULL chip info. Its
76 parameters are described in more detail below.
78 devm_hwmon_device_register_with_info is similar to
79 hwmon_device_register_with_info. However, it is device managed, meaning the
80 hwmon device does not have to be removed explicitly by the removal function.
82 hwmon_device_unregister deregisters a registered hardware monitoring device.
83 The parameter of this function is the pointer to the registered hardware
84 monitoring device structure. This function must be called from the driver
85 remove function if the hardware monitoring device was registered with
86 hwmon_device_register_with_groups or hwmon_device_register_with_info.
88 devm_hwmon_device_unregister does not normally have to be called. It is only
89 needed for error handling, and only needed if the driver probe fails after
90 the call to devm_hwmon_device_register_with_groups or
91 hwmon_device_register_with_info and if the automatic (device managed)
92 removal would be too late.
94 All supported hwmon device registration functions only accept valid device
95 names. Device names including invalid characters (whitespace, '*', or '-')
96 will be rejected. The 'name' parameter is mandatory.
98 Using devm_hwmon_device_register_with_info()
99 --------------------------------------------
101 hwmon_device_register_with_info() registers a hardware monitoring device.
102 The parameters to this function are
104 =============================================== ===============================================
105 `struct device *dev` Pointer to parent device
106 `const char *name` Device name
107 `void *drvdata` Driver private data
108 `const struct hwmon_chip_info *info` Pointer to chip description.
109 `const struct attribute_group **extra_groups` Null-terminated list of additional non-standard
110 sysfs attribute groups.
111 =============================================== ===============================================
113 This function returns a pointer to the created hardware monitoring device
114 on success and a negative error code for failure.
116 The hwmon_chip_info structure looks as follows::
118 struct hwmon_chip_info {
119 const struct hwmon_ops *ops;
120 const struct hwmon_channel_info **info;
123 It contains the following fields:
126 Pointer to device operations.
128 NULL-terminated list of device channel descriptors.
130 The list of hwmon operations is defined as::
133 umode_t (*is_visible)(const void *, enum hwmon_sensor_types type,
135 int (*read)(struct device *, enum hwmon_sensor_types type,
136 u32 attr, int, long *);
137 int (*write)(struct device *, enum hwmon_sensor_types type,
138 u32 attr, int, long);
141 It defines the following operations.
144 Pointer to a function to return the file mode for each supported
145 attribute. This function is mandatory.
148 Pointer to a function for reading a value from the chip. This function
149 is optional, but must be provided if any readable attributes exist.
152 Pointer to a function for writing a value to the chip. This function is
153 optional, but must be provided if any writeable attributes exist.
155 Each sensor channel is described with struct hwmon_channel_info, which is
158 struct hwmon_channel_info {
159 enum hwmon_sensor_types type;
163 It contains following fields:
166 The hardware monitoring sensor type.
168 Supported sensor types are
170 ================== ==================================================
171 hwmon_chip A virtual sensor type, used to describe attributes
172 which are not bound to a specific input or output
173 hwmon_temp Temperature sensor
174 hwmon_in Voltage sensor
175 hwmon_curr Current sensor
176 hwmon_power Power sensor
177 hwmon_energy Energy sensor
178 hwmon_humidity Humidity sensor
179 hwmon_fan Fan speed sensor
180 hwmon_pwm PWM control
181 ================== ==================================================
184 Pointer to a 0-terminated list of configuration values for each
185 sensor of the given type. Each value is a combination of bit values
186 describing the attributes supposed by a single sensor.
188 As an example, here is the complete description file for a LM75 compatible
189 sensor chip. The chip has a single temperature sensor. The driver wants to
190 register with the thermal subsystem (HWMON_C_REGISTER_TZ), and it supports
191 the update_interval attribute (HWMON_C_UPDATE_INTERVAL). The chip supports
192 reading the temperature (HWMON_T_INPUT), it has a maximum temperature
193 register (HWMON_T_MAX) as well as a maximum temperature hysteresis register
196 static const u32 lm75_chip_config[] = {
197 HWMON_C_REGISTER_TZ | HWMON_C_UPDATE_INTERVAL,
201 static const struct hwmon_channel_info lm75_chip = {
203 .config = lm75_chip_config,
206 static const u32 lm75_temp_config[] = {
207 HWMON_T_INPUT | HWMON_T_MAX | HWMON_T_MAX_HYST,
211 static const struct hwmon_channel_info lm75_temp = {
213 .config = lm75_temp_config,
216 static const struct hwmon_channel_info *lm75_info[] = {
222 The HWMON_CHANNEL_INFO() macro can and should be used when possible.
223 With this macro, the above example can be simplified to
225 static const struct hwmon_channel_info *lm75_info[] = {
226 HWMON_CHANNEL_INFO(chip,
227 HWMON_C_REGISTER_TZ | HWMON_C_UPDATE_INTERVAL),
228 HWMON_CHANNEL_INFO(temp,
229 HWMON_T_INPUT | HWMON_T_MAX | HWMON_T_MAX_HYST),
233 The remaining declarations are as follows.
235 static const struct hwmon_ops lm75_hwmon_ops = {
236 .is_visible = lm75_is_visible,
241 static const struct hwmon_chip_info lm75_chip_info = {
242 .ops = &lm75_hwmon_ops,
246 A complete list of bit values indicating individual attribute support
247 is defined in include/linux/hwmon.h. Definition prefixes are as follows.
249 =============== =================================================
250 HWMON_C_xxxx Chip attributes, for use with hwmon_chip.
251 HWMON_T_xxxx Temperature attributes, for use with hwmon_temp.
252 HWMON_I_xxxx Voltage attributes, for use with hwmon_in.
253 HWMON_C_xxxx Current attributes, for use with hwmon_curr.
254 Notice the prefix overlap with chip attributes.
255 HWMON_P_xxxx Power attributes, for use with hwmon_power.
256 HWMON_E_xxxx Energy attributes, for use with hwmon_energy.
257 HWMON_H_xxxx Humidity attributes, for use with hwmon_humidity.
258 HWMON_F_xxxx Fan speed attributes, for use with hwmon_fan.
259 HWMON_PWM_xxxx PWM control attributes, for use with hwmon_pwm.
260 =============== =================================================
262 Driver callback functions
263 -------------------------
265 Each driver provides is_visible, read, and write functions. Parameters
266 and return values for those functions are as follows::
268 umode_t is_visible_func(const void *data, enum hwmon_sensor_types type,
269 u32 attr, int channel)
273 Pointer to device private data structure.
277 Attribute identifier associated with a specific attribute.
278 For example, the attribute value for HWMON_T_INPUT would be
279 hwmon_temp_input. For complete mappings of bit fields to
280 attribute values please see include/linux/hwmon.h.
282 The sensor channel number.
285 The file mode for this attribute. Typically, this will be 0 (the
286 attribute will not be created), S_IRUGO, or 'S_IRUGO | S_IWUSR'.
290 int read_func(struct device *dev, enum hwmon_sensor_types type,
291 u32 attr, int channel, long *val)
295 Pointer to the hardware monitoring device.
299 Attribute identifier associated with a specific attribute.
300 For example, the attribute value for HWMON_T_INPUT would be
301 hwmon_temp_input. For complete mappings please see
302 include/linux/hwmon.h.
304 The sensor channel number.
306 Pointer to attribute value.
309 0 on success, a negative error number otherwise.
313 int write_func(struct device *dev, enum hwmon_sensor_types type,
314 u32 attr, int channel, long val)
318 Pointer to the hardware monitoring device.
322 Attribute identifier associated with a specific attribute.
323 For example, the attribute value for HWMON_T_INPUT would be
324 hwmon_temp_input. For complete mappings please see
325 include/linux/hwmon.h.
327 The sensor channel number.
329 The value to write to the chip.
332 0 on success, a negative error number otherwise.
335 Driver-provided sysfs attributes
336 --------------------------------
338 If the hardware monitoring device is registered with
339 hwmon_device_register_with_info or devm_hwmon_device_register_with_info,
340 it is most likely not necessary to provide sysfs attributes. Only additional
341 non-standard sysfs attributes need to be provided when one of those registration
344 The header file linux/hwmon-sysfs.h provides a number of useful macros to
345 declare and use hardware monitoring sysfs attributes.
347 In many cases, you can use the exsting define DEVICE_ATTR or its variants
348 DEVICE_ATTR_{RW,RO,WO} to declare such attributes. This is feasible if an
349 attribute has no additional context. However, in many cases there will be
350 additional information such as a sensor index which will need to be passed
351 to the sysfs attribute handling function.
353 SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR and SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR_2 can be used to define attributes
354 which need such additional context information. SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR requires
355 one additional argument, SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR_2 requires two.
357 Simplified variants of SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR and SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR_2 are available
358 and should be used if standard attribute permissions and function names are
359 feasible. Standard permissions are 0644 for SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR[_2]_RW,
360 0444 for SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR[_2]_RO, and 0200 for SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR[_2]_WO.
361 Standard functions, similar to DEVICE_ATTR_{RW,RO,WO}, have _show and _store
362 appended to the provided function name.
364 SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR and its variants define a struct sensor_device_attribute
365 variable. This structure has the following fields::
367 struct sensor_device_attribute {
368 struct device_attribute dev_attr;
372 You can use to_sensor_dev_attr to get the pointer to this structure from the
373 attribute read or write function. Its parameter is the device to which the
374 attribute is attached.
376 SENSOR_DEVICE_ATTR_2 and its variants define a struct sensor_device_attribute_2
377 variable, which is defined as follows::
379 struct sensor_device_attribute_2 {
380 struct device_attribute dev_attr;
385 Use to_sensor_dev_attr_2 to get the pointer to this structure. Its parameter
386 is the device to which the attribute is attached.