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1 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
2 <!DOCTYPE book PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.1.2//EN"
3 "http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.1.2/docbookx.dtd" []>
5 <book id="LinuxKernelAPI">
6 <bookinfo>
7 <title>The Linux Kernel API</title>
9 <legalnotice>
10 <para>
11 This documentation is free software; you can redistribute
12 it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public
13 License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either
14 version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later
15 version.
16 </para>
18 <para>
19 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be
20 useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied
21 warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
22 See the GNU General Public License for more details.
23 </para>
25 <para>
26 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public
27 License along with this program; if not, write to the Free
28 Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston,
29 MA 02111-1307 USA
30 </para>
32 <para>
33 For more details see the file COPYING in the source
34 distribution of Linux.
35 </para>
36 </legalnotice>
37 </bookinfo>
39 <toc></toc>
41 <chapter id="Basics">
42 <title>Driver Basics</title>
43 <sect1><title>Driver Entry and Exit points</title>
44 !Iinclude/linux/init.h
45 </sect1>
47 <sect1><title>Atomic and pointer manipulation</title>
48 !Iinclude/asm-x86/atomic_32.h
49 !Iinclude/asm-x86/unaligned.h
50 </sect1>
52 <sect1><title>Delaying, scheduling, and timer routines</title>
53 !Iinclude/linux/sched.h
54 !Ekernel/sched.c
55 !Ekernel/timer.c
56 </sect1>
57 <sect1><title>High-resolution timers</title>
58 !Iinclude/linux/ktime.h
59 !Iinclude/linux/hrtimer.h
60 !Ekernel/hrtimer.c
61 </sect1>
62 <sect1><title>Workqueues and Kevents</title>
63 !Ekernel/workqueue.c
64 </sect1>
65 <sect1><title>Internal Functions</title>
66 !Ikernel/exit.c
67 !Ikernel/signal.c
68 !Iinclude/linux/kthread.h
69 !Ekernel/kthread.c
70 </sect1>
72 <sect1><title>Kernel objects manipulation</title>
73 <!--
74 X!Iinclude/linux/kobject.h
75 -->
76 !Elib/kobject.c
77 </sect1>
79 <sect1><title>Kernel utility functions</title>
80 !Iinclude/linux/kernel.h
81 !Ekernel/printk.c
82 !Ekernel/panic.c
83 !Ekernel/sys.c
84 !Ekernel/rcupdate.c
85 </sect1>
87 <sect1><title>Device Resource Management</title>
88 !Edrivers/base/devres.c
89 </sect1>
91 </chapter>
93 <chapter id="adt">
94 <title>Data Types</title>
95 <sect1><title>Doubly Linked Lists</title>
96 !Iinclude/linux/list.h
97 </sect1>
98 </chapter>
100 <chapter id="libc">
101 <title>Basic C Library Functions</title>
103 <para>
104 When writing drivers, you cannot in general use routines which are
105 from the C Library. Some of the functions have been found generally
106 useful and they are listed below. The behaviour of these functions
107 may vary slightly from those defined by ANSI, and these deviations
108 are noted in the text.
109 </para>
111 <sect1><title>String Conversions</title>
112 !Ilib/vsprintf.c
113 !Elib/vsprintf.c
114 </sect1>
115 <sect1><title>String Manipulation</title>
116 <!-- All functions are exported at now
117 X!Ilib/string.c
119 !Elib/string.c
120 </sect1>
121 <sect1><title>Bit Operations</title>
122 !Iinclude/asm-x86/bitops_32.h
123 </sect1>
124 </chapter>
126 <chapter id="kernel-lib">
127 <title>Basic Kernel Library Functions</title>
129 <para>
130 The Linux kernel provides more basic utility functions.
131 </para>
133 <sect1><title>Bitmap Operations</title>
134 !Elib/bitmap.c
135 !Ilib/bitmap.c
136 </sect1>
138 <sect1><title>Command-line Parsing</title>
139 !Elib/cmdline.c
140 </sect1>
142 <sect1 id="crc"><title>CRC Functions</title>
143 !Elib/crc7.c
144 !Elib/crc16.c
145 !Elib/crc-itu-t.c
146 !Elib/crc32.c
147 !Elib/crc-ccitt.c
148 </sect1>
149 </chapter>
151 <chapter id="mm">
152 <title>Memory Management in Linux</title>
153 <sect1><title>The Slab Cache</title>
154 !Iinclude/linux/slab.h
155 !Emm/slab.c
156 </sect1>
157 <sect1><title>User Space Memory Access</title>
158 !Iinclude/asm-x86/uaccess_32.h
159 !Earch/x86/lib/usercopy_32.c
160 </sect1>
161 <sect1><title>More Memory Management Functions</title>
162 !Emm/readahead.c
163 !Emm/filemap.c
164 !Emm/memory.c
165 !Emm/vmalloc.c
166 !Imm/page_alloc.c
167 !Emm/mempool.c
168 !Emm/dmapool.c
169 !Emm/page-writeback.c
170 !Emm/truncate.c
171 </sect1>
172 </chapter>
175 <chapter id="ipc">
176 <title>Kernel IPC facilities</title>
178 <sect1><title>IPC utilities</title>
179 !Iipc/util.c
180 </sect1>
181 </chapter>
183 <chapter id="kfifo">
184 <title>FIFO Buffer</title>
185 <sect1><title>kfifo interface</title>
186 !Iinclude/linux/kfifo.h
187 !Ekernel/kfifo.c
188 </sect1>
189 </chapter>
191 <chapter id="relayfs">
192 <title>relay interface support</title>
194 <para>
195 Relay interface support
196 is designed to provide an efficient mechanism for tools and
197 facilities to relay large amounts of data from kernel space to
198 user space.
199 </para>
201 <sect1><title>relay interface</title>
202 !Ekernel/relay.c
203 !Ikernel/relay.c
204 </sect1>
205 </chapter>
207 <chapter id="modload">
208 <title>Module Support</title>
209 <sect1><title>Module Loading</title>
210 !Ekernel/kmod.c
211 </sect1>
212 <sect1><title>Inter Module support</title>
213 <para>
214 Refer to the file kernel/module.c for more information.
215 </para>
216 <!-- FIXME: Removed for now since no structured comments in source
217 X!Ekernel/module.c
219 </sect1>
220 </chapter>
222 <chapter id="hardware">
223 <title>Hardware Interfaces</title>
224 <sect1><title>Interrupt Handling</title>
225 !Ekernel/irq/manage.c
226 </sect1>
228 <sect1><title>DMA Channels</title>
229 !Ekernel/dma.c
230 </sect1>
232 <sect1><title>Resources Management</title>
233 !Ikernel/resource.c
234 !Ekernel/resource.c
235 </sect1>
237 <sect1><title>MTRR Handling</title>
238 !Earch/x86/kernel/cpu/mtrr/main.c
239 </sect1>
241 <sect1><title>PCI Support Library</title>
242 !Edrivers/pci/pci.c
243 !Edrivers/pci/pci-driver.c
244 !Edrivers/pci/remove.c
245 !Edrivers/pci/pci-acpi.c
246 !Edrivers/pci/search.c
247 !Edrivers/pci/msi.c
248 !Edrivers/pci/bus.c
249 <!-- FIXME: Removed for now since no structured comments in source
250 X!Edrivers/pci/hotplug.c
252 !Edrivers/pci/probe.c
253 !Edrivers/pci/rom.c
254 </sect1>
255 <sect1><title>PCI Hotplug Support Library</title>
256 !Edrivers/pci/hotplug/pci_hotplug_core.c
257 </sect1>
258 <sect1><title>MCA Architecture</title>
259 <sect2><title>MCA Device Functions</title>
260 <para>
261 Refer to the file arch/x86/kernel/mca_32.c for more information.
262 </para>
263 <!-- FIXME: Removed for now since no structured comments in source
264 X!Earch/x86/kernel/mca_32.c
266 </sect2>
267 <sect2><title>MCA Bus DMA</title>
268 !Iinclude/asm-x86/mca_dma.h
269 </sect2>
270 </sect1>
271 </chapter>
273 <chapter id="firmware">
274 <title>Firmware Interfaces</title>
275 <sect1><title>DMI Interfaces</title>
276 !Edrivers/firmware/dmi_scan.c
277 </sect1>
278 <sect1><title>EDD Interfaces</title>
279 !Idrivers/firmware/edd.c
280 </sect1>
281 </chapter>
283 <chapter id="security">
284 <title>Security Framework</title>
285 !Isecurity/security.c
286 </chapter>
288 <chapter id="audit">
289 <title>Audit Interfaces</title>
290 !Ekernel/audit.c
291 !Ikernel/auditsc.c
292 !Ikernel/auditfilter.c
293 </chapter>
295 <chapter id="accounting">
296 <title>Accounting Framework</title>
297 !Ikernel/acct.c
298 </chapter>
300 <chapter id="pmfuncs">
301 <title>Power Management</title>
302 !Ekernel/power/pm.c
303 </chapter>
305 <chapter id="devdrivers">
306 <title>Device drivers infrastructure</title>
307 <sect1><title>Device Drivers Base</title>
308 <!--
309 X!Iinclude/linux/device.h
311 !Edrivers/base/driver.c
312 !Edrivers/base/core.c
313 !Edrivers/base/class.c
314 !Edrivers/base/firmware_class.c
315 !Edrivers/base/transport_class.c
316 <!-- Cannot be included, because
317 attribute_container_add_class_device_adapter
318 and attribute_container_classdev_to_container
319 exceed allowed 44 characters maximum
320 X!Edrivers/base/attribute_container.c
322 !Edrivers/base/sys.c
323 <!--
324 X!Edrivers/base/interface.c
326 !Edrivers/base/platform.c
327 !Edrivers/base/bus.c
328 </sect1>
329 <sect1><title>Device Drivers Power Management</title>
330 !Edrivers/base/power/main.c
331 </sect1>
332 <sect1><title>Device Drivers ACPI Support</title>
333 <!-- Internal functions only
334 X!Edrivers/acpi/sleep/main.c
335 X!Edrivers/acpi/sleep/wakeup.c
336 X!Edrivers/acpi/motherboard.c
337 X!Edrivers/acpi/bus.c
339 !Edrivers/acpi/scan.c
340 !Idrivers/acpi/scan.c
341 <!-- No correct structured comments
342 X!Edrivers/acpi/pci_bind.c
344 </sect1>
345 <sect1><title>Device drivers PnP support</title>
346 !Idrivers/pnp/core.c
347 <!-- No correct structured comments
348 X!Edrivers/pnp/system.c
350 !Edrivers/pnp/card.c
351 !Idrivers/pnp/driver.c
352 !Edrivers/pnp/manager.c
353 !Edrivers/pnp/support.c
354 </sect1>
355 <sect1><title>Userspace IO devices</title>
356 !Edrivers/uio/uio.c
357 !Iinclude/linux/uio_driver.h
358 </sect1>
359 </chapter>
361 <chapter id="blkdev">
362 <title>Block Devices</title>
363 !Eblock/blk-core.c
364 <<<<<<< HEAD:Documentation/DocBook/kernel-api.tmpl
365 =======
366 !Iblock/blk-core.c
367 >>>>>>> 264e3e889d86e552b4191d69bb60f4f3b383135a:Documentation/DocBook/kernel-api.tmpl
368 !Eblock/blk-map.c
369 !Iblock/blk-sysfs.c
370 !Eblock/blk-settings.c
371 !Eblock/blk-exec.c
372 !Eblock/blk-barrier.c
373 !Eblock/blk-tag.c
374 <<<<<<< HEAD:Documentation/DocBook/kernel-api.tmpl
375 =======
376 !Iblock/blk-tag.c
377 >>>>>>> 264e3e889d86e552b4191d69bb60f4f3b383135a:Documentation/DocBook/kernel-api.tmpl
378 </chapter>
380 <chapter id="chrdev">
381 <title>Char devices</title>
382 !Efs/char_dev.c
383 </chapter>
385 <chapter id="miscdev">
386 <title>Miscellaneous Devices</title>
387 !Edrivers/char/misc.c
388 </chapter>
390 <chapter id="parportdev">
391 <title>Parallel Port Devices</title>
392 !Iinclude/linux/parport.h
393 !Edrivers/parport/ieee1284.c
394 !Edrivers/parport/share.c
395 !Idrivers/parport/daisy.c
396 </chapter>
398 <chapter id="message_devices">
399 <title>Message-based devices</title>
400 <sect1><title>Fusion message devices</title>
401 !Edrivers/message/fusion/mptbase.c
402 !Idrivers/message/fusion/mptbase.c
403 !Edrivers/message/fusion/mptscsih.c
404 !Idrivers/message/fusion/mptscsih.c
405 !Idrivers/message/fusion/mptctl.c
406 !Idrivers/message/fusion/mptspi.c
407 !Idrivers/message/fusion/mptfc.c
408 !Idrivers/message/fusion/mptlan.c
409 </sect1>
410 <sect1><title>I2O message devices</title>
411 !Iinclude/linux/i2o.h
412 !Idrivers/message/i2o/core.h
413 !Edrivers/message/i2o/iop.c
414 !Idrivers/message/i2o/iop.c
415 !Idrivers/message/i2o/config-osm.c
416 !Edrivers/message/i2o/exec-osm.c
417 !Idrivers/message/i2o/exec-osm.c
418 !Idrivers/message/i2o/bus-osm.c
419 !Edrivers/message/i2o/device.c
420 !Idrivers/message/i2o/device.c
421 !Idrivers/message/i2o/driver.c
422 !Idrivers/message/i2o/pci.c
423 !Idrivers/message/i2o/i2o_block.c
424 !Idrivers/message/i2o/i2o_scsi.c
425 !Idrivers/message/i2o/i2o_proc.c
426 </sect1>
427 </chapter>
429 <chapter id="snddev">
430 <title>Sound Devices</title>
431 !Iinclude/sound/core.h
432 !Esound/sound_core.c
433 !Iinclude/sound/pcm.h
434 !Esound/core/pcm.c
435 !Esound/core/device.c
436 !Esound/core/info.c
437 !Esound/core/rawmidi.c
438 !Esound/core/sound.c
439 !Esound/core/memory.c
440 !Esound/core/pcm_memory.c
441 !Esound/core/init.c
442 !Esound/core/isadma.c
443 !Esound/core/control.c
444 !Esound/core/pcm_lib.c
445 !Esound/core/hwdep.c
446 !Esound/core/pcm_native.c
447 !Esound/core/memalloc.c
448 <!-- FIXME: Removed for now since no structured comments in source
449 X!Isound/sound_firmware.c
451 </chapter>
453 <chapter id="uart16x50">
454 <title>16x50 UART Driver</title>
455 !Iinclude/linux/serial_core.h
456 !Edrivers/serial/serial_core.c
457 !Edrivers/serial/8250.c
458 </chapter>
460 <chapter id="fbdev">
461 <title>Frame Buffer Library</title>
463 <para>
464 The frame buffer drivers depend heavily on four data structures.
465 These structures are declared in include/linux/fb.h. They are
466 fb_info, fb_var_screeninfo, fb_fix_screeninfo and fb_monospecs.
467 The last three can be made available to and from userland.
468 </para>
470 <para>
471 fb_info defines the current state of a particular video card.
472 Inside fb_info, there exists a fb_ops structure which is a
473 collection of needed functions to make fbdev and fbcon work.
474 fb_info is only visible to the kernel.
475 </para>
477 <para>
478 fb_var_screeninfo is used to describe the features of a video card
479 that are user defined. With fb_var_screeninfo, things such as
480 depth and the resolution may be defined.
481 </para>
483 <para>
484 The next structure is fb_fix_screeninfo. This defines the
485 properties of a card that are created when a mode is set and can't
486 be changed otherwise. A good example of this is the start of the
487 frame buffer memory. This "locks" the address of the frame buffer
488 memory, so that it cannot be changed or moved.
489 </para>
491 <para>
492 The last structure is fb_monospecs. In the old API, there was
493 little importance for fb_monospecs. This allowed for forbidden things
494 such as setting a mode of 800x600 on a fix frequency monitor. With
495 the new API, fb_monospecs prevents such things, and if used
496 correctly, can prevent a monitor from being cooked. fb_monospecs
497 will not be useful until kernels 2.5.x.
498 </para>
500 <sect1><title>Frame Buffer Memory</title>
501 !Edrivers/video/fbmem.c
502 </sect1>
503 <!--
504 <sect1><title>Frame Buffer Console</title>
505 X!Edrivers/video/console/fbcon.c
506 </sect1>
508 <sect1><title>Frame Buffer Colormap</title>
509 !Edrivers/video/fbcmap.c
510 </sect1>
511 <!-- FIXME:
512 drivers/video/fbgen.c has no docs, which stuffs up the sgml. Comment
513 out until somebody adds docs. KAO
514 <sect1><title>Frame Buffer Generic Functions</title>
515 X!Idrivers/video/fbgen.c
516 </sect1>
517 KAO -->
518 <sect1><title>Frame Buffer Video Mode Database</title>
519 !Idrivers/video/modedb.c
520 !Edrivers/video/modedb.c
521 </sect1>
522 <sect1><title>Frame Buffer Macintosh Video Mode Database</title>
523 !Edrivers/video/macmodes.c
524 </sect1>
525 <sect1><title>Frame Buffer Fonts</title>
526 <para>
527 Refer to the file drivers/video/console/fonts.c for more information.
528 </para>
529 <!-- FIXME: Removed for now since no structured comments in source
530 X!Idrivers/video/console/fonts.c
532 </sect1>
533 </chapter>
535 <chapter id="input_subsystem">
536 <title>Input Subsystem</title>
537 !Iinclude/linux/input.h
538 !Edrivers/input/input.c
539 !Edrivers/input/ff-core.c
540 !Edrivers/input/ff-memless.c
541 </chapter>
543 <chapter id="spi">
544 <title>Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI)</title>
545 <para>
546 SPI is the "Serial Peripheral Interface", widely used with
547 embedded systems because it is a simple and efficient
548 interface: basically a multiplexed shift register.
549 Its three signal wires hold a clock (SCK, often in the range
550 of 1-20 MHz), a "Master Out, Slave In" (MOSI) data line, and
551 a "Master In, Slave Out" (MISO) data line.
552 SPI is a full duplex protocol; for each bit shifted out the
553 MOSI line (one per clock) another is shifted in on the MISO line.
554 Those bits are assembled into words of various sizes on the
555 way to and from system memory.
556 An additional chipselect line is usually active-low (nCS);
557 four signals are normally used for each peripheral, plus
558 sometimes an interrupt.
559 </para>
560 <para>
561 The SPI bus facilities listed here provide a generalized
562 interface to declare SPI busses and devices, manage them
563 according to the standard Linux driver model, and perform
564 input/output operations.
565 At this time, only "master" side interfaces are supported,
566 where Linux talks to SPI peripherals and does not implement
567 such a peripheral itself.
568 (Interfaces to support implementing SPI slaves would
569 necessarily look different.)
570 </para>
571 <para>
572 The programming interface is structured around two kinds of driver,
573 and two kinds of device.
574 A "Controller Driver" abstracts the controller hardware, which may
575 be as simple as a set of GPIO pins or as complex as a pair of FIFOs
576 connected to dual DMA engines on the other side of the SPI shift
577 register (maximizing throughput). Such drivers bridge between
578 whatever bus they sit on (often the platform bus) and SPI, and
579 expose the SPI side of their device as a
580 <structname>struct spi_master</structname>.
581 SPI devices are children of that master, represented as a
582 <structname>struct spi_device</structname> and manufactured from
583 <structname>struct spi_board_info</structname> descriptors which
584 are usually provided by board-specific initialization code.
585 A <structname>struct spi_driver</structname> is called a
586 "Protocol Driver", and is bound to a spi_device using normal
587 driver model calls.
588 </para>
589 <para>
590 The I/O model is a set of queued messages. Protocol drivers
591 submit one or more <structname>struct spi_message</structname>
592 objects, which are processed and completed asynchronously.
593 (There are synchronous wrappers, however.) Messages are
594 built from one or more <structname>struct spi_transfer</structname>
595 objects, each of which wraps a full duplex SPI transfer.
596 A variety of protocol tweaking options are needed, because
597 different chips adopt very different policies for how they
598 use the bits transferred with SPI.
599 </para>
600 !Iinclude/linux/spi/spi.h
601 !Fdrivers/spi/spi.c spi_register_board_info
602 !Edrivers/spi/spi.c
603 </chapter>
605 <chapter id="i2c">
606 <title>I<superscript>2</superscript>C and SMBus Subsystem</title>
608 <para>
609 I<superscript>2</superscript>C (or without fancy typography, "I2C")
610 is an acronym for the "Inter-IC" bus, a simple bus protocol which is
611 widely used where low data rate communications suffice.
612 Since it's also a licensed trademark, some vendors use another
613 name (such as "Two-Wire Interface", TWI) for the same bus.
614 I2C only needs two signals (SCL for clock, SDA for data), conserving
615 board real estate and minimizing signal quality issues.
616 Most I2C devices use seven bit addresses, and bus speeds of up
617 to 400 kHz; there's a high speed extension (3.4 MHz) that's not yet
618 found wide use.
619 I2C is a multi-master bus; open drain signaling is used to
620 arbitrate between masters, as well as to handshake and to
621 synchronize clocks from slower clients.
622 </para>
624 <para>
625 The Linux I2C programming interfaces support only the master
626 side of bus interactions, not the slave side.
627 The programming interface is structured around two kinds of driver,
628 and two kinds of device.
629 An I2C "Adapter Driver" abstracts the controller hardware; it binds
630 to a physical device (perhaps a PCI device or platform_device) and
631 exposes a <structname>struct i2c_adapter</structname> representing
632 each I2C bus segment it manages.
633 On each I2C bus segment will be I2C devices represented by a
634 <structname>struct i2c_client</structname>. Those devices will
635 be bound to a <structname>struct i2c_driver</structname>,
636 which should follow the standard Linux driver model.
637 (At this writing, a legacy model is more widely used.)
638 There are functions to perform various I2C protocol operations; at
639 this writing all such functions are usable only from task context.
640 </para>
642 <para>
643 The System Management Bus (SMBus) is a sibling protocol. Most SMBus
644 systems are also I2C conformant. The electrical constraints are
645 tighter for SMBus, and it standardizes particular protocol messages
646 and idioms. Controllers that support I2C can also support most
647 SMBus operations, but SMBus controllers don't support all the protocol
648 options that an I2C controller will.
649 There are functions to perform various SMBus protocol operations,
650 either using I2C primitives or by issuing SMBus commands to
651 i2c_adapter devices which don't support those I2C operations.
652 </para>
654 !Iinclude/linux/i2c.h
655 !Fdrivers/i2c/i2c-boardinfo.c i2c_register_board_info
656 !Edrivers/i2c/i2c-core.c
657 </chapter>
659 </book>