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+======================
+Legacy GPIO Interfaces
+======================
+
+This provides an overview of GPIO access conventions on Linux.
+
+These calls use the gpio_* naming prefix. No other calls should use that
+prefix, or the related __gpio_* prefix.
+
+
+What is a GPIO?
+===============
+A "General Purpose Input/Output" (GPIO) is a flexible software-controlled
+digital signal. They are provided from many kinds of chip, and are familiar
+to Linux developers working with embedded and custom hardware. Each GPIO
+represents a bit connected to a particular pin, or "ball" on Ball Grid Array
+(BGA) packages. Board schematics show which external hardware connects to
+which GPIOs. Drivers can be written generically, so that board setup code
+passes such pin configuration data to drivers.
+
+System-on-Chip (SOC) processors heavily rely on GPIOs. In some cases, every
+non-dedicated pin can be configured as a GPIO; and most chips have at least
+several dozen of them. Programmable logic devices (like FPGAs) can easily
+provide GPIOs; multifunction chips like power managers, and audio codecs
+often have a few such pins to help with pin scarcity on SOCs; and there are
+also "GPIO Expander" chips that connect using the I2C or SPI serial busses.
+Most PC southbridges have a few dozen GPIO-capable pins (with only the BIOS
+firmware knowing how they're used).
+
+The exact capabilities of GPIOs vary between systems. Common options:
+
+ - Output values are writable (high=1, low=0). Some chips also have
+ options about how that value is driven, so that for example only one
+ value might be driven ... supporting "wire-OR" and similar schemes
+ for the other value (notably, "open drain" signaling).
+
+ - Input values are likewise readable (1, 0). Some chips support readback
+ of pins configured as "output", which is very useful in such "wire-OR"
+ cases (to support bidirectional signaling). GPIO controllers may have
+ input de-glitch/debounce logic, sometimes with software controls.
+
+ - Inputs can often be used as IRQ signals, often edge triggered but
+ sometimes level triggered. Such IRQs may be configurable as system
+ wakeup events, to wake the system from a low power state.
+
+ - Usually a GPIO will be configurable as either input or output, as needed
+ by different product boards; single direction ones exist too.
+
+ - Most GPIOs can be accessed while holding spinlocks, but those accessed
+ through a serial bus normally can't. Some systems support both types.
+
+On a given board each GPIO is used for one specific purpose like monitoring
+MMC/SD card insertion/removal, detecting card writeprotect status, driving
+a LED, configuring a transceiver, bitbanging a serial bus, poking a hardware
+watchdog, sensing a switch, and so on.
+
+
+GPIO conventions
+================
+Note that this is called a "convention" because you don't need to do it this
+way, and it's no crime if you don't. There **are** cases where portability
+is not the main issue; GPIOs are often used for the kind of board-specific
+glue logic that may even change between board revisions, and can't ever be
+used on a board that's wired differently. Only least-common-denominator
+functionality can be very portable. Other features are platform-specific,
+and that can be critical for glue logic.
+
+Plus, this doesn't require any implementation framework, just an interface.
+One platform might implement it as simple inline functions accessing chip
+registers; another might implement it by delegating through abstractions
+used for several very different kinds of GPIO controller. (There is some
+optional code supporting such an implementation strategy, described later
+in this document, but drivers acting as clients to the GPIO interface must
+not care how it's implemented.)
+
+That said, if the convention is supported on their platform, drivers should
+use it when possible. Platforms must select GPIOLIB if GPIO functionality
+is strictly required. Drivers that can't work without
+standard GPIO calls should have Kconfig entries which depend on GPIOLIB. The
+GPIO calls are available, either as "real code" or as optimized-away stubs,
+when drivers use the include file:
+
+ #include <linux/gpio.h>
+
+If you stick to this convention then it'll be easier for other developers to
+see what your code is doing, and help maintain it.
+
+Note that these operations include I/O barriers on platforms which need to
+use them; drivers don't need to add them explicitly.
+
+
+Identifying GPIOs
+-----------------
+GPIOs are identified by unsigned integers in the range 0..MAX_INT. That
+reserves "negative" numbers for other purposes like marking signals as
+"not available on this board", or indicating faults. Code that doesn't
+touch the underlying hardware treats these integers as opaque cookies.
+
+Platforms define how they use those integers, and usually #define symbols
+for the GPIO lines so that board-specific setup code directly corresponds
+to the relevant schematics. In contrast, drivers should only use GPIO
+numbers passed to them from that setup code, using platform_data to hold
+board-specific pin configuration data (along with other board specific
+data they need). That avoids portability problems.
+
+So for example one platform uses numbers 32-159 for GPIOs; while another
+uses numbers 0..63 with one set of GPIO controllers, 64-79 with another
+type of GPIO controller, and on one particular board 80-95 with an FPGA.
+The numbers need not be contiguous; either of those platforms could also
+use numbers 2000-2063 to identify GPIOs in a bank of I2C GPIO expanders.
+
+If you want to initialize a structure with an invalid GPIO number, use
+some negative number (perhaps "-EINVAL"); that will never be valid. To
+test if such number from such a structure could reference a GPIO, you
+may use this predicate:
+
+ int gpio_is_valid(int number);
+
+A number that's not valid will be rejected by calls which may request
+or free GPIOs (see below). Other numbers may also be rejected; for
+example, a number might be valid but temporarily unused on a given board.
+
+Whether a platform supports multiple GPIO controllers is a platform-specific
+implementation issue, as are whether that support can leave "holes" in the space
+of GPIO numbers, and whether new controllers can be added at runtime. Such issues
+can affect things including whether adjacent GPIO numbers are both valid.
+
+Using GPIOs
+-----------
+The first thing a system should do with a GPIO is allocate it, using
+the gpio_request() call; see later.
+
+One of the next things to do with a GPIO, often in board setup code when
+setting up a platform_device using the GPIO, is mark its direction::
+
+ /* set as input or output, returning 0 or negative errno */
+ int gpio_direction_input(unsigned gpio);
+ int gpio_direction_output(unsigned gpio, int value);
+
+The return value is zero for success, else a negative errno. It should
+be checked, since the get/set calls don't have error returns and since
+misconfiguration is possible. You should normally issue these calls from
+a task context. However, for spinlock-safe GPIOs it's OK to use them
+before tasking is enabled, as part of early board setup.
+
+For output GPIOs, the value provided becomes the initial output value.
+This helps avoid signal glitching during system startup.
+
+For compatibility with legacy interfaces to GPIOs, setting the direction
+of a GPIO implicitly requests that GPIO (see below) if it has not been
+requested already. That compatibility is being removed from the optional
+gpiolib framework.
+
+Setting the direction can fail if the GPIO number is invalid, or when
+that particular GPIO can't be used in that mode. It's generally a bad
+idea to rely on boot firmware to have set the direction correctly, since
+it probably wasn't validated to do more than boot Linux. (Similarly,
+that board setup code probably needs to multiplex that pin as a GPIO,
+and configure pullups/pulldowns appropriately.)
+
+
+Spinlock-Safe GPIO access
+-------------------------
+Most GPIO controllers can be accessed with memory read/write instructions.
+Those don't need to sleep, and can safely be done from inside hard
+(nonthreaded) IRQ handlers and similar contexts.
+
+Use the following calls to access such GPIOs,
+for which gpio_cansleep() will always return false (see below)::
+
+ /* GPIO INPUT: return zero or nonzero */
+ int gpio_get_value(unsigned gpio);
+
+ /* GPIO OUTPUT */
+ void gpio_set_value(unsigned gpio, int value);
+
+The values are boolean, zero for low, nonzero for high. When reading the
+value of an output pin, the value returned should be what's seen on the
+pin ... that won't always match the specified output value, because of
+issues including open-drain signaling and output latencies.
+
+The get/set calls have no error returns because "invalid GPIO" should have
+been reported earlier from gpio_direction_*(). However, note that not all
+platforms can read the value of output pins; those that can't should always
+return zero. Also, using these calls for GPIOs that can't safely be accessed
+without sleeping (see below) is an error.
+
+Platform-specific implementations are encouraged to optimize the two
+calls to access the GPIO value in cases where the GPIO number (and for
+output, value) are constant. It's normal for them to need only a couple
+of instructions in such cases (reading or writing a hardware register),
+and not to need spinlocks. Such optimized calls can make bitbanging
+applications a lot more efficient (in both space and time) than spending
+dozens of instructions on subroutine calls.
+
+
+GPIO access that may sleep
+--------------------------
+Some GPIO controllers must be accessed using message based busses like I2C
+or SPI. Commands to read or write those GPIO values require waiting to
+get to the head of a queue to transmit a command and get its response.
+This requires sleeping, which can't be done from inside IRQ handlers.
+
+Platforms that support this type of GPIO distinguish them from other GPIOs
+by returning nonzero from this call (which requires a valid GPIO number,
+which should have been previously allocated with gpio_request)::
+
+ int gpio_cansleep(unsigned gpio);
+
+To access such GPIOs, a different set of accessors is defined::
+
+ /* GPIO INPUT: return zero or nonzero, might sleep */
+ int gpio_get_value_cansleep(unsigned gpio);
+
+ /* GPIO OUTPUT, might sleep */
+ void gpio_set_value_cansleep(unsigned gpio, int value);
+
+
+Accessing such GPIOs requires a context which may sleep, for example
+a threaded IRQ handler, and those accessors must be used instead of
+spinlock-safe accessors without the cansleep() name suffix.
+
+Other than the fact that these accessors might sleep, and will work
+on GPIOs that can't be accessed from hardIRQ handlers, these calls act
+the same as the spinlock-safe calls.
+
+**IN ADDITION** calls to setup and configure such GPIOs must be made
+from contexts which may sleep, since they may need to access the GPIO
+controller chip too (These setup calls are usually made from board
+setup or driver probe/teardown code, so this is an easy constraint.)::
+
+ gpio_direction_input()
+ gpio_direction_output()
+ gpio_request()
+
+ ## gpio_request_one()
+ ## gpio_request_array()
+ ## gpio_free_array()
+
+ gpio_free()
+ gpio_set_debounce()
+
+
+
+Claiming and Releasing GPIOs
+----------------------------
+To help catch system configuration errors, two calls are defined::
+
+ /* request GPIO, returning 0 or negative errno.
+ * non-null labels may be useful for diagnostics.
+ */
+ int gpio_request(unsigned gpio, const char *label);
+
+ /* release previously-claimed GPIO */
+ void gpio_free(unsigned gpio);
+
+Passing invalid GPIO numbers to gpio_request() will fail, as will requesting
+GPIOs that have already been claimed with that call. The return value of
+gpio_request() must be checked. You should normally issue these calls from
+a task context. However, for spinlock-safe GPIOs it's OK to request GPIOs
+before tasking is enabled, as part of early board setup.
+
+These calls serve two basic purposes. One is marking the signals which
+are actually in use as GPIOs, for better diagnostics; systems may have
+several hundred potential GPIOs, but often only a dozen are used on any
+given board. Another is to catch conflicts, identifying errors when
+(a) two or more drivers wrongly think they have exclusive use of that
+signal, or (b) something wrongly believes it's safe to remove drivers
+needed to manage a signal that's in active use. That is, requesting a
+GPIO can serve as a kind of lock.
+
+Some platforms may also use knowledge about what GPIOs are active for
+power management, such as by powering down unused chip sectors and, more
+easily, gating off unused clocks.
+
+For GPIOs that use pins known to the pinctrl subsystem, that subsystem should
+be informed of their use; a gpiolib driver's .request() operation may call
+pinctrl_gpio_request(), and a gpiolib driver's .free() operation may call
+pinctrl_gpio_free(). The pinctrl subsystem allows a pinctrl_gpio_request()
+to succeed concurrently with a pin or pingroup being "owned" by a device for
+pin multiplexing.
+
+Any programming of pin multiplexing hardware that is needed to route the
+GPIO signal to the appropriate pin should occur within a GPIO driver's
+.direction_input() or .direction_output() operations, and occur after any
+setup of an output GPIO's value. This allows a glitch-free migration from a
+pin's special function to GPIO. This is sometimes required when using a GPIO
+to implement a workaround on signals typically driven by a non-GPIO HW block.
+
+Some platforms allow some or all GPIO signals to be routed to different pins.
+Similarly, other aspects of the GPIO or pin may need to be configured, such as
+pullup/pulldown. Platform software should arrange that any such details are
+configured prior to gpio_request() being called for those GPIOs, e.g. using
+the pinctrl subsystem's mapping table, so that GPIO users need not be aware
+of these details.
+
+Also note that it's your responsibility to have stopped using a GPIO
+before you free it.
+
+Considering in most cases GPIOs are actually configured right after they
+are claimed, three additional calls are defined::
+
+ /* request a single GPIO, with initial configuration specified by
+ * 'flags', identical to gpio_request() wrt other arguments and
+ * return value
+ */
+ int gpio_request_one(unsigned gpio, unsigned long flags, const char *label);
+
+ /* request multiple GPIOs in a single call
+ */
+ int gpio_request_array(struct gpio *array, size_t num);
+
+ /* release multiple GPIOs in a single call
+ */
+ void gpio_free_array(struct gpio *array, size_t num);
+
+where 'flags' is currently defined to specify the following properties:
+
+ * GPIOF_DIR_IN - to configure direction as input
+ * GPIOF_DIR_OUT - to configure direction as output
+
+ * GPIOF_INIT_LOW - as output, set initial level to LOW
+ * GPIOF_INIT_HIGH - as output, set initial level to HIGH
+ * GPIOF_OPEN_DRAIN - gpio pin is open drain type.
+ * GPIOF_OPEN_SOURCE - gpio pin is open source type.
+
+ * GPIOF_EXPORT_DIR_FIXED - export gpio to sysfs, keep direction
+ * GPIOF_EXPORT_DIR_CHANGEABLE - also export, allow changing direction
+
+since GPIOF_INIT_* are only valid when configured as output, so group valid
+combinations as:
+
+ * GPIOF_IN - configure as input
+ * GPIOF_OUT_INIT_LOW - configured as output, initial level LOW
+ * GPIOF_OUT_INIT_HIGH - configured as output, initial level HIGH
+
+When setting the flag as GPIOF_OPEN_DRAIN then it will assume that pins is
+open drain type. Such pins will not be driven to 1 in output mode. It is
+require to connect pull-up on such pins. By enabling this flag, gpio lib will
+make the direction to input when it is asked to set value of 1 in output mode
+to make the pin HIGH. The pin is make to LOW by driving value 0 in output mode.
+
+When setting the flag as GPIOF_OPEN_SOURCE then it will assume that pins is
+open source type. Such pins will not be driven to 0 in output mode. It is
+require to connect pull-down on such pin. By enabling this flag, gpio lib will
+make the direction to input when it is asked to set value of 0 in output mode
+to make the pin LOW. The pin is make to HIGH by driving value 1 in output mode.
+
+In the future, these flags can be extended to support more properties.
+
+Further more, to ease the claim/release of multiple GPIOs, 'struct gpio' is
+introduced to encapsulate all three fields as::
+
+ struct gpio {
+ unsigned gpio;
+ unsigned long flags;
+ const char *label;
+ };
+
+A typical example of usage::
+
+ static struct gpio leds_gpios[] = {
+ { 32, GPIOF_OUT_INIT_HIGH, "Power LED" }, /* default to ON */
+ { 33, GPIOF_OUT_INIT_LOW, "Green LED" }, /* default to OFF */
+ { 34, GPIOF_OUT_INIT_LOW, "Red LED" }, /* default to OFF */
+ { 35, GPIOF_OUT_INIT_LOW, "Blue LED" }, /* default to OFF */
+ { ... },
+ };
+
+ err = gpio_request_one(31, GPIOF_IN, "Reset Button");
+ if (err)
+ ...
+
+ err = gpio_request_array(leds_gpios, ARRAY_SIZE(leds_gpios));
+ if (err)
+ ...
+
+ gpio_free_array(leds_gpios, ARRAY_SIZE(leds_gpios));
+
+
+GPIOs mapped to IRQs
+--------------------
+GPIO numbers are unsigned integers; so are IRQ numbers. These make up
+two logically distinct namespaces (GPIO 0 need not use IRQ 0). You can
+map between them using calls like::
+
+ /* map GPIO numbers to IRQ numbers */
+ int gpio_to_irq(unsigned gpio);
+
+ /* map IRQ numbers to GPIO numbers (avoid using this) */
+ int irq_to_gpio(unsigned irq);
+
+Those return either the corresponding number in the other namespace, or
+else a negative errno code if the mapping can't be done. (For example,
+some GPIOs can't be used as IRQs.) It is an unchecked error to use a GPIO
+number that wasn't set up as an input using gpio_direction_input(), or
+to use an IRQ number that didn't originally come from gpio_to_irq().
+
+These two mapping calls are expected to cost on the order of a single
+addition or subtraction. They're not allowed to sleep.
+
+Non-error values returned from gpio_to_irq() can be passed to request_irq()
+or free_irq(). They will often be stored into IRQ resources for platform
+devices, by the board-specific initialization code. Note that IRQ trigger
+options are part of the IRQ interface, e.g. IRQF_TRIGGER_FALLING, as are
+system wakeup capabilities.
+
+Non-error values returned from irq_to_gpio() would most commonly be used
+with gpio_get_value(), for example to initialize or update driver state
+when the IRQ is edge-triggered. Note that some platforms don't support
+this reverse mapping, so you should avoid using it.
+
+
+Emulating Open Drain Signals
+----------------------------
+Sometimes shared signals need to use "open drain" signaling, where only the
+low signal level is actually driven. (That term applies to CMOS transistors;
+"open collector" is used for TTL.) A pullup resistor causes the high signal
+level. This is sometimes called a "wire-AND"; or more practically, from the
+negative logic (low=true) perspective this is a "wire-OR".
+
+One common example of an open drain signal is a shared active-low IRQ line.
+Also, bidirectional data bus signals sometimes use open drain signals.
+
+Some GPIO controllers directly support open drain outputs; many don't. When
+you need open drain signaling but your hardware doesn't directly support it,
+there's a common idiom you can use to emulate it with any GPIO pin that can
+be used as either an input or an output:
+
+ LOW: gpio_direction_output(gpio, 0) ... this drives the signal
+ and overrides the pullup.
+
+ HIGH: gpio_direction_input(gpio) ... this turns off the output,
+ so the pullup (or some other device) controls the signal.
+
+If you are "driving" the signal high but gpio_get_value(gpio) reports a low
+value (after the appropriate rise time passes), you know some other component
+is driving the shared signal low. That's not necessarily an error. As one
+common example, that's how I2C clocks are stretched: a slave that needs a
+slower clock delays the rising edge of SCK, and the I2C master adjusts its
+signaling rate accordingly.
+
+
+GPIO controllers and the pinctrl subsystem
+------------------------------------------
+
+A GPIO controller on a SOC might be tightly coupled with the pinctrl
+subsystem, in the sense that the pins can be used by other functions
+together with an optional gpio feature. We have already covered the
+case where e.g. a GPIO controller need to reserve a pin or set the
+direction of a pin by calling any of::
+
+ pinctrl_gpio_request()
+ pinctrl_gpio_free()
+ pinctrl_gpio_direction_input()
+ pinctrl_gpio_direction_output()
+
+But how does the pin control subsystem cross-correlate the GPIO
+numbers (which are a global business) to a certain pin on a certain
+pin controller?
+
+This is done by registering "ranges" of pins, which are essentially
+cross-reference tables. These are described in
+Documentation/driver-api/pin-control.rst
+
+While the pin allocation is totally managed by the pinctrl subsystem,
+gpio (under gpiolib) is still maintained by gpio drivers. It may happen
+that different pin ranges in a SoC is managed by different gpio drivers.
+
+This makes it logical to let gpio drivers announce their pin ranges to
+the pin ctrl subsystem before it will call 'pinctrl_gpio_request' in order
+to request the corresponding pin to be prepared by the pinctrl subsystem
+before any gpio usage.
+
+For this, the gpio controller can register its pin range with pinctrl
+subsystem. There are two ways of doing it currently: with or without DT.
+
+For with DT support refer to Documentation/devicetree/bindings/gpio/gpio.txt.
+
+For non-DT support, user can call gpiochip_add_pin_range() with appropriate
+parameters to register a range of gpio pins with a pinctrl driver. For this
+exact name string of pinctrl device has to be passed as one of the
+argument to this routine.
+
+
+What do these conventions omit?
+===============================
+One of the biggest things these conventions omit is pin multiplexing, since
+this is highly chip-specific and nonportable. One platform might not need
+explicit multiplexing; another might have just two options for use of any
+given pin; another might have eight options per pin; another might be able
+to route a given GPIO to any one of several pins. (Yes, those examples all
+come from systems that run Linux today.)
+
+Related to multiplexing is configuration and enabling of the pullups or
+pulldowns integrated on some platforms. Not all platforms support them,
+or support them in the same way; and any given board might use external
+pullups (or pulldowns) so that the on-chip ones should not be used.
+(When a circuit needs 5 kOhm, on-chip 100 kOhm resistors won't do.)
+Likewise drive strength (2 mA vs 20 mA) and voltage (1.8V vs 3.3V) is a
+platform-specific issue, as are models like (not) having a one-to-one
+correspondence between configurable pins and GPIOs.
+
+There are other system-specific mechanisms that are not specified here,
+like the aforementioned options for input de-glitching and wire-OR output.
+Hardware may support reading or writing GPIOs in gangs, but that's usually
+configuration dependent: for GPIOs sharing the same bank. (GPIOs are
+commonly grouped in banks of 16 or 32, with a given SOC having several such
+banks.) Some systems can trigger IRQs from output GPIOs, or read values
+from pins not managed as GPIOs. Code relying on such mechanisms will
+necessarily be nonportable.
+
+Dynamic definition of GPIOs is not currently standard; for example, as
+a side effect of configuring an add-on board with some GPIO expanders.
+
+
+GPIO implementor's framework (OPTIONAL)
+=======================================
+As noted earlier, there is an optional implementation framework making it
+easier for platforms to support different kinds of GPIO controller using
+the same programming interface. This framework is called "gpiolib".
+
+As a debugging aid, if debugfs is available a /sys/kernel/debug/gpio file
+will be found there. That will list all the controllers registered through
+this framework, and the state of the GPIOs currently in use.
+
+
+Controller Drivers: gpio_chip
+-----------------------------
+In this framework each GPIO controller is packaged as a "struct gpio_chip"
+with information common to each controller of that type:
+
+ - methods to establish GPIO direction
+ - methods used to access GPIO values
+ - flag saying whether calls to its methods may sleep
+ - optional debugfs dump method (showing extra state like pullup config)
+ - label for diagnostics
+
+There is also per-instance data, which may come from device.platform_data:
+the number of its first GPIO, and how many GPIOs it exposes.
+
+The code implementing a gpio_chip should support multiple instances of the
+controller, possibly using the driver model. That code will configure each
+gpio_chip and issue gpiochip_add(). Removing a GPIO controller should be
+rare; use gpiochip_remove() when it is unavoidable.
+
+Most often a gpio_chip is part of an instance-specific structure with state
+not exposed by the GPIO interfaces, such as addressing, power management,
+and more. Chips such as codecs will have complex non-GPIO state.
+
+Any debugfs dump method should normally ignore signals which haven't been
+requested as GPIOs. They can use gpiochip_is_requested(), which returns
+either NULL or the label associated with that GPIO when it was requested.
+
+
+Platform Support
+----------------
+To force-enable this framework, a platform's Kconfig will "select" GPIOLIB,
+else it is up to the user to configure support for GPIO.
+
+It may also provide a custom value for ARCH_NR_GPIOS, so that it better
+reflects the number of GPIOs in actual use on that platform, without
+wasting static table space. (It should count both built-in/SoC GPIOs and
+also ones on GPIO expanders.
+
+If neither of these options are selected, the platform does not support
+GPIOs through GPIO-lib and the code cannot be enabled by the user.
+
+Trivial implementations of those functions can directly use framework
+code, which always dispatches through the gpio_chip::
+
+ #define gpio_get_value __gpio_get_value
+ #define gpio_set_value __gpio_set_value
+ #define gpio_cansleep __gpio_cansleep
+
+Fancier implementations could instead define those as inline functions with
+logic optimizing access to specific SOC-based GPIOs. For example, if the
+referenced GPIO is the constant "12", getting or setting its value could
+cost as little as two or three instructions, never sleeping. When such an
+optimization is not possible those calls must delegate to the framework
+code, costing at least a few dozen instructions. For bitbanged I/O, such
+instruction savings can be significant.
+
+For SOCs, platform-specific code defines and registers gpio_chip instances
+for each bank of on-chip GPIOs. Those GPIOs should be numbered/labeled to
+match chip vendor documentation, and directly match board schematics. They
+may well start at zero and go up to a platform-specific limit. Such GPIOs
+are normally integrated into platform initialization to make them always be
+available, from arch_initcall() or earlier; they can often serve as IRQs.
+
+
+Board Support
+-------------
+For external GPIO controllers -- such as I2C or SPI expanders, ASICs, multi
+function devices, FPGAs or CPLDs -- most often board-specific code handles
+registering controller devices and ensures that their drivers know what GPIO
+numbers to use with gpiochip_add(). Their numbers often start right after
+platform-specific GPIOs.
+
+For example, board setup code could create structures identifying the range
+of GPIOs that chip will expose, and passes them to each GPIO expander chip
+using platform_data. Then the chip driver's probe() routine could pass that
+data to gpiochip_add().
+
+Initialization order can be important. For example, when a device relies on
+an I2C-based GPIO, its probe() routine should only be called after that GPIO
+becomes available. That may mean the device should not be registered until
+calls for that GPIO can work. One way to address such dependencies is for
+such gpio_chip controllers to provide setup() and teardown() callbacks to
+board specific code; those board specific callbacks would register devices
+once all the necessary resources are available, and remove them later when
+the GPIO controller device becomes unavailable.
+
+
+Sysfs Interface for Userspace (OPTIONAL)
+========================================
+Platforms which use the "gpiolib" implementors framework may choose to
+configure a sysfs user interface to GPIOs. This is different from the
+debugfs interface, since it provides control over GPIO direction and
+value instead of just showing a gpio state summary. Plus, it could be
+present on production systems without debugging support.
+
+Given appropriate hardware documentation for the system, userspace could
+know for example that GPIO #23 controls the write protect line used to
+protect boot loader segments in flash memory. System upgrade procedures
+may need to temporarily remove that protection, first importing a GPIO,
+then changing its output state, then updating the code before re-enabling
+the write protection. In normal use, GPIO #23 would never be touched,
+and the kernel would have no need to know about it.
+
+Again depending on appropriate hardware documentation, on some systems
+userspace GPIO can be used to determine system configuration data that
+standard kernels won't know about. And for some tasks, simple userspace
+GPIO drivers could be all that the system really needs.
+
+Note that standard kernel drivers exist for common "LEDs and Buttons"
+GPIO tasks: "leds-gpio" and "gpio_keys", respectively. Use those
+instead of talking directly to the GPIOs; they integrate with kernel
+frameworks better than your userspace code could.
+
+
+Paths in Sysfs
+--------------
+There are three kinds of entry in /sys/class/gpio:
+
+ - Control interfaces used to get userspace control over GPIOs;
+
+ - GPIOs themselves; and
+
+ - GPIO controllers ("gpio_chip" instances).
+
+That's in addition to standard files including the "device" symlink.
+
+The control interfaces are write-only:
+
+ /sys/class/gpio/
+
+ "export" ... Userspace may ask the kernel to export control of
+ a GPIO to userspace by writing its number to this file.
+
+ Example: "echo 19 > export" will create a "gpio19" node
+ for GPIO #19, if that's not requested by kernel code.
+
+ "unexport" ... Reverses the effect of exporting to userspace.
+
+ Example: "echo 19 > unexport" will remove a "gpio19"
+ node exported using the "export" file.
+
+GPIO signals have paths like /sys/class/gpio/gpio42/ (for GPIO #42)
+and have the following read/write attributes:
+
+ /sys/class/gpio/gpioN/
+
+ "direction" ... reads as either "in" or "out". This value may
+ normally be written. Writing as "out" defaults to
+ initializing the value as low. To ensure glitch free
+ operation, values "low" and "high" may be written to
+ configure the GPIO as an output with that initial value.
+
+ Note that this attribute *will not exist* if the kernel
+ doesn't support changing the direction of a GPIO, or
+ it was exported by kernel code that didn't explicitly
+ allow userspace to reconfigure this GPIO's direction.
+
+ "value" ... reads as either 0 (low) or 1 (high). If the GPIO
+ is configured as an output, this value may be written;
+ any nonzero value is treated as high.
+
+ If the pin can be configured as interrupt-generating interrupt
+ and if it has been configured to generate interrupts (see the
+ description of "edge"), you can poll(2) on that file and
+ poll(2) will return whenever the interrupt was triggered. If
+ you use poll(2), set the events POLLPRI. If you use select(2),
+ set the file descriptor in exceptfds. After poll(2) returns,
+ either lseek(2) to the beginning of the sysfs file and read the
+ new value or close the file and re-open it to read the value.
+
+ "edge" ... reads as either "none", "rising", "falling", or
+ "both". Write these strings to select the signal edge(s)
+ that will make poll(2) on the "value" file return.
+
+ This file exists only if the pin can be configured as an
+ interrupt generating input pin.
+
+ "active_low" ... reads as either 0 (false) or 1 (true). Write
+ any nonzero value to invert the value attribute both
+ for reading and writing. Existing and subsequent
+ poll(2) support configuration via the edge attribute
+ for "rising" and "falling" edges will follow this
+ setting.
+
+GPIO controllers have paths like /sys/class/gpio/gpiochip42/ (for the
+controller implementing GPIOs starting at #42) and have the following
+read-only attributes:
+
+ /sys/class/gpio/gpiochipN/
+
+ "base" ... same as N, the first GPIO managed by this chip
+
+ "label" ... provided for diagnostics (not always unique)
+
+ "ngpio" ... how many GPIOs this manges (N to N + ngpio - 1)
+
+Board documentation should in most cases cover what GPIOs are used for
+what purposes. However, those numbers are not always stable; GPIOs on
+a daughtercard might be different depending on the base board being used,
+or other cards in the stack. In such cases, you may need to use the
+gpiochip nodes (possibly in conjunction with schematics) to determine
+the correct GPIO number to use for a given signal.
+
+
+Exporting from Kernel code
+--------------------------
+Kernel code can explicitly manage exports of GPIOs which have already been
+requested using gpio_request()::
+
+ /* export the GPIO to userspace */
+ int gpio_export(unsigned gpio, bool direction_may_change);
+
+ /* reverse gpio_export() */
+ void gpio_unexport();
+
+ /* create a sysfs link to an exported GPIO node */
+ int gpio_export_link(struct device *dev, const char *name,
+ unsigned gpio)
+
+After a kernel driver requests a GPIO, it may only be made available in
+the sysfs interface by gpio_export(). The driver can control whether the
+signal direction may change. This helps drivers prevent userspace code
+from accidentally clobbering important system state.
+
+This explicit exporting can help with debugging (by making some kinds
+of experiments easier), or can provide an always-there interface that's
+suitable for documenting as part of a board support package.
+
+After the GPIO has been exported, gpio_export_link() allows creating
+symlinks from elsewhere in sysfs to the GPIO sysfs node. Drivers can
+use this to provide the interface under their own device in sysfs with
+a descriptive name.
+
+
+API Reference
+=============
+
+The functions listed in this section are deprecated. The GPIO descriptor based
+API should be used in new code.
+
+.. kernel-doc:: drivers/gpio/gpiolib-legacy.c
+ :export: