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Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation/driver-api/spi.rst')
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diff --git a/Documentation/driver-api/spi.rst b/Documentation/driver-api/spi.rst new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..f288870450 --- /dev/null +++ b/Documentation/driver-api/spi.rst @@ -0,0 +1,53 @@ +Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI) +================================= + +SPI is the "Serial Peripheral Interface", widely used with embedded +systems because it is a simple and efficient interface: basically a +multiplexed shift register. Its three signal wires hold a clock (SCK, +often in the range of 1-20 MHz), a "Master Out, Slave In" (MOSI) data +line, and a "Master In, Slave Out" (MISO) data line. SPI is a full +duplex protocol; for each bit shifted out the MOSI line (one per clock) +another is shifted in on the MISO line. Those bits are assembled into +words of various sizes on the way to and from system memory. An +additional chipselect line is usually active-low (nCS); four signals are +normally used for each peripheral, plus sometimes an interrupt. + +The SPI bus facilities listed here provide a generalized interface to +declare SPI busses and devices, manage them according to the standard +Linux driver model, and perform input/output operations. At this time, +only "master" side interfaces are supported, where Linux talks to SPI +peripherals and does not implement such a peripheral itself. (Interfaces +to support implementing SPI slaves would necessarily look different.) + +The programming interface is structured around two kinds of driver, and +two kinds of device. A "Controller Driver" abstracts the controller +hardware, which may be as simple as a set of GPIO pins or as complex as +a pair of FIFOs connected to dual DMA engines on the other side of the +SPI shift register (maximizing throughput). Such drivers bridge between +whatever bus they sit on (often the platform bus) and SPI, and expose +the SPI side of their device as a :c:type:`struct spi_controller +<spi_controller>`. SPI devices are children of that master, +represented as a :c:type:`struct spi_device <spi_device>` and +manufactured from :c:type:`struct spi_board_info +<spi_board_info>` descriptors which are usually provided by +board-specific initialization code. A :c:type:`struct spi_driver +<spi_driver>` is called a "Protocol Driver", and is bound to a +spi_device using normal driver model calls. + +The I/O model is a set of queued messages. Protocol drivers submit one +or more :c:type:`struct spi_message <spi_message>` objects, +which are processed and completed asynchronously. (There are synchronous +wrappers, however.) Messages are built from one or more +:c:type:`struct spi_transfer <spi_transfer>` objects, each of +which wraps a full duplex SPI transfer. A variety of protocol tweaking +options are needed, because different chips adopt very different +policies for how they use the bits transferred with SPI. + +.. kernel-doc:: include/linux/spi/spi.h + :internal: + +.. kernel-doc:: drivers/spi/spi.c + :functions: spi_register_board_info + +.. kernel-doc:: drivers/spi/spi.c + :export: |