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author | Linus Torvalds <torvalds@ppc970.osdl.org> | 2005-04-16 18:20:36 -0400 |
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committer | Linus Torvalds <torvalds@ppc970.osdl.org> | 2005-04-16 18:20:36 -0400 |
commit | 1da177e4c3f41524e886b7f1b8a0c1fc7321cac2 (patch) | |
tree | 0bba044c4ce775e45a88a51686b5d9f90697ea9d /Documentation/filesystems/sysfs.txt |
Linux-2.6.12-rc2v2.6.12-rc2
Initial git repository build. I'm not bothering with the full history,
even though we have it. We can create a separate "historical" git
archive of that later if we want to, and in the meantime it's about
3.2GB when imported into git - space that would just make the early
git days unnecessarily complicated, when we don't have a lot of good
infrastructure for it.
Let it rip!
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1 | |||
2 | sysfs - _The_ filesystem for exporting kernel objects. | ||
3 | |||
4 | Patrick Mochel <mochel@osdl.org> | ||
5 | |||
6 | 10 January 2003 | ||
7 | |||
8 | |||
9 | What it is: | ||
10 | ~~~~~~~~~~~ | ||
11 | |||
12 | sysfs is a ram-based filesystem initially based on ramfs. It provides | ||
13 | a means to export kernel data structures, their attributes, and the | ||
14 | linkages between them to userspace. | ||
15 | |||
16 | sysfs is tied inherently to the kobject infrastructure. Please read | ||
17 | Documentation/kobject.txt for more information concerning the kobject | ||
18 | interface. | ||
19 | |||
20 | |||
21 | Using sysfs | ||
22 | ~~~~~~~~~~~ | ||
23 | |||
24 | sysfs is always compiled in. You can access it by doing: | ||
25 | |||
26 | mount -t sysfs sysfs /sys | ||
27 | |||
28 | |||
29 | Directory Creation | ||
30 | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ | ||
31 | |||
32 | For every kobject that is registered with the system, a directory is | ||
33 | created for it in sysfs. That directory is created as a subdirectory | ||
34 | of the kobject's parent, expressing internal object hierarchies to | ||
35 | userspace. Top-level directories in sysfs represent the common | ||
36 | ancestors of object hierarchies; i.e. the subsystems the objects | ||
37 | belong to. | ||
38 | |||
39 | Sysfs internally stores the kobject that owns the directory in the | ||
40 | ->d_fsdata pointer of the directory's dentry. This allows sysfs to do | ||
41 | reference counting directly on the kobject when the file is opened and | ||
42 | closed. | ||
43 | |||
44 | |||
45 | Attributes | ||
46 | ~~~~~~~~~~ | ||
47 | |||
48 | Attributes can be exported for kobjects in the form of regular files in | ||
49 | the filesystem. Sysfs forwards file I/O operations to methods defined | ||
50 | for the attributes, providing a means to read and write kernel | ||
51 | attributes. | ||
52 | |||
53 | Attributes should be ASCII text files, preferably with only one value | ||
54 | per file. It is noted that it may not be efficient to contain only | ||
55 | value per file, so it is socially acceptable to express an array of | ||
56 | values of the same type. | ||
57 | |||
58 | Mixing types, expressing multiple lines of data, and doing fancy | ||
59 | formatting of data is heavily frowned upon. Doing these things may get | ||
60 | you publically humiliated and your code rewritten without notice. | ||
61 | |||
62 | |||
63 | An attribute definition is simply: | ||
64 | |||
65 | struct attribute { | ||
66 | char * name; | ||
67 | mode_t mode; | ||
68 | }; | ||
69 | |||
70 | |||
71 | int sysfs_create_file(struct kobject * kobj, struct attribute * attr); | ||
72 | void sysfs_remove_file(struct kobject * kobj, struct attribute * attr); | ||
73 | |||
74 | |||
75 | A bare attribute contains no means to read or write the value of the | ||
76 | attribute. Subsystems are encouraged to define their own attribute | ||
77 | structure and wrapper functions for adding and removing attributes for | ||
78 | a specific object type. | ||
79 | |||
80 | For example, the driver model defines struct device_attribute like: | ||
81 | |||
82 | struct device_attribute { | ||
83 | struct attribute attr; | ||
84 | ssize_t (*show)(struct device * dev, char * buf); | ||
85 | ssize_t (*store)(struct device * dev, const char * buf); | ||
86 | }; | ||
87 | |||
88 | int device_create_file(struct device *, struct device_attribute *); | ||
89 | void device_remove_file(struct device *, struct device_attribute *); | ||
90 | |||
91 | It also defines this helper for defining device attributes: | ||
92 | |||
93 | #define DEVICE_ATTR(_name,_mode,_show,_store) \ | ||
94 | struct device_attribute dev_attr_##_name = { \ | ||
95 | .attr = {.name = __stringify(_name) , .mode = _mode }, \ | ||
96 | .show = _show, \ | ||
97 | .store = _store, \ | ||
98 | }; | ||
99 | |||
100 | For example, declaring | ||
101 | |||
102 | static DEVICE_ATTR(foo,0644,show_foo,store_foo); | ||
103 | |||
104 | is equivalent to doing: | ||
105 | |||
106 | static struct device_attribute dev_attr_foo = { | ||
107 | .attr = { | ||
108 | .name = "foo", | ||
109 | .mode = 0644, | ||
110 | }, | ||
111 | .show = show_foo, | ||
112 | .store = store_foo, | ||
113 | }; | ||
114 | |||
115 | |||
116 | Subsystem-Specific Callbacks | ||
117 | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ | ||
118 | |||
119 | When a subsystem defines a new attribute type, it must implement a | ||
120 | set of sysfs operations for forwarding read and write calls to the | ||
121 | show and store methods of the attribute owners. | ||
122 | |||
123 | struct sysfs_ops { | ||
124 | ssize_t (*show)(struct kobject *, struct attribute *,char *); | ||
125 | ssize_t (*store)(struct kobject *,struct attribute *,const char *); | ||
126 | }; | ||
127 | |||
128 | [ Subsystems should have already defined a struct kobj_type as a | ||
129 | descriptor for this type, which is where the sysfs_ops pointer is | ||
130 | stored. See the kobject documentation for more information. ] | ||
131 | |||
132 | When a file is read or written, sysfs calls the appropriate method | ||
133 | for the type. The method then translates the generic struct kobject | ||
134 | and struct attribute pointers to the appropriate pointer types, and | ||
135 | calls the associated methods. | ||
136 | |||
137 | |||
138 | To illustrate: | ||
139 | |||
140 | #define to_dev_attr(_attr) container_of(_attr,struct device_attribute,attr) | ||
141 | #define to_dev(d) container_of(d, struct device, kobj) | ||
142 | |||
143 | static ssize_t | ||
144 | dev_attr_show(struct kobject * kobj, struct attribute * attr, char * buf) | ||
145 | { | ||
146 | struct device_attribute * dev_attr = to_dev_attr(attr); | ||
147 | struct device * dev = to_dev(kobj); | ||
148 | ssize_t ret = 0; | ||
149 | |||
150 | if (dev_attr->show) | ||
151 | ret = dev_attr->show(dev,buf); | ||
152 | return ret; | ||
153 | } | ||
154 | |||
155 | |||
156 | |||
157 | Reading/Writing Attribute Data | ||
158 | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ | ||
159 | |||
160 | To read or write attributes, show() or store() methods must be | ||
161 | specified when declaring the attribute. The method types should be as | ||
162 | simple as those defined for device attributes: | ||
163 | |||
164 | ssize_t (*show)(struct device * dev, char * buf); | ||
165 | ssize_t (*store)(struct device * dev, const char * buf); | ||
166 | |||
167 | IOW, they should take only an object and a buffer as parameters. | ||
168 | |||
169 | |||
170 | sysfs allocates a buffer of size (PAGE_SIZE) and passes it to the | ||
171 | method. Sysfs will call the method exactly once for each read or | ||
172 | write. This forces the following behavior on the method | ||
173 | implementations: | ||
174 | |||
175 | - On read(2), the show() method should fill the entire buffer. | ||
176 | Recall that an attribute should only be exporting one value, or an | ||
177 | array of similar values, so this shouldn't be that expensive. | ||
178 | |||
179 | This allows userspace to do partial reads and seeks arbitrarily over | ||
180 | the entire file at will. | ||
181 | |||
182 | - On write(2), sysfs expects the entire buffer to be passed during the | ||
183 | first write. Sysfs then passes the entire buffer to the store() | ||
184 | method. | ||
185 | |||
186 | When writing sysfs files, userspace processes should first read the | ||
187 | entire file, modify the values it wishes to change, then write the | ||
188 | entire buffer back. | ||
189 | |||
190 | Attribute method implementations should operate on an identical | ||
191 | buffer when reading and writing values. | ||
192 | |||
193 | Other notes: | ||
194 | |||
195 | - The buffer will always be PAGE_SIZE bytes in length. On i386, this | ||
196 | is 4096. | ||
197 | |||
198 | - show() methods should return the number of bytes printed into the | ||
199 | buffer. This is the return value of snprintf(). | ||
200 | |||
201 | - show() should always use snprintf(). | ||
202 | |||
203 | - store() should return the number of bytes used from the buffer. This | ||
204 | can be done using strlen(). | ||
205 | |||
206 | - show() or store() can always return errors. If a bad value comes | ||
207 | through, be sure to return an error. | ||
208 | |||
209 | - The object passed to the methods will be pinned in memory via sysfs | ||
210 | referencing counting its embedded object. However, the physical | ||
211 | entity (e.g. device) the object represents may not be present. Be | ||
212 | sure to have a way to check this, if necessary. | ||
213 | |||
214 | |||
215 | A very simple (and naive) implementation of a device attribute is: | ||
216 | |||
217 | static ssize_t show_name(struct device * dev, char * buf) | ||
218 | { | ||
219 | return sprintf(buf,"%s\n",dev->name); | ||
220 | } | ||
221 | |||
222 | static ssize_t store_name(struct device * dev, const char * buf) | ||
223 | { | ||
224 | sscanf(buf,"%20s",dev->name); | ||
225 | return strlen(buf); | ||
226 | } | ||
227 | |||
228 | static DEVICE_ATTR(name,S_IRUGO,show_name,store_name); | ||
229 | |||
230 | |||
231 | (Note that the real implementation doesn't allow userspace to set the | ||
232 | name for a device.) | ||
233 | |||
234 | |||
235 | Top Level Directory Layout | ||
236 | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ | ||
237 | |||
238 | The sysfs directory arrangement exposes the relationship of kernel | ||
239 | data structures. | ||
240 | |||
241 | The top level sysfs diretory looks like: | ||
242 | |||
243 | block/ | ||
244 | bus/ | ||
245 | class/ | ||
246 | devices/ | ||
247 | firmware/ | ||
248 | net/ | ||
249 | |||
250 | devices/ contains a filesystem representation of the device tree. It maps | ||
251 | directly to the internal kernel device tree, which is a hierarchy of | ||
252 | struct device. | ||
253 | |||
254 | bus/ contains flat directory layout of the various bus types in the | ||
255 | kernel. Each bus's directory contains two subdirectories: | ||
256 | |||
257 | devices/ | ||
258 | drivers/ | ||
259 | |||
260 | devices/ contains symlinks for each device discovered in the system | ||
261 | that point to the device's directory under root/. | ||
262 | |||
263 | drivers/ contains a directory for each device driver that is loaded | ||
264 | for devices on that particular bus (this assumes that drivers do not | ||
265 | span multiple bus types). | ||
266 | |||
267 | |||
268 | More information can driver-model specific features can be found in | ||
269 | Documentation/driver-model/. | ||
270 | |||
271 | |||
272 | TODO: Finish this section. | ||
273 | |||
274 | |||
275 | Current Interfaces | ||
276 | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ | ||
277 | |||
278 | The following interface layers currently exist in sysfs: | ||
279 | |||
280 | |||
281 | - devices (include/linux/device.h) | ||
282 | ---------------------------------- | ||
283 | Structure: | ||
284 | |||
285 | struct device_attribute { | ||
286 | struct attribute attr; | ||
287 | ssize_t (*show)(struct device * dev, char * buf); | ||
288 | ssize_t (*store)(struct device * dev, const char * buf); | ||
289 | }; | ||
290 | |||
291 | Declaring: | ||
292 | |||
293 | DEVICE_ATTR(_name,_str,_mode,_show,_store); | ||
294 | |||
295 | Creation/Removal: | ||
296 | |||
297 | int device_create_file(struct device *device, struct device_attribute * attr); | ||
298 | void device_remove_file(struct device * dev, struct device_attribute * attr); | ||
299 | |||
300 | |||
301 | - bus drivers (include/linux/device.h) | ||
302 | -------------------------------------- | ||
303 | Structure: | ||
304 | |||
305 | struct bus_attribute { | ||
306 | struct attribute attr; | ||
307 | ssize_t (*show)(struct bus_type *, char * buf); | ||
308 | ssize_t (*store)(struct bus_type *, const char * buf); | ||
309 | }; | ||
310 | |||
311 | Declaring: | ||
312 | |||
313 | BUS_ATTR(_name,_mode,_show,_store) | ||
314 | |||
315 | Creation/Removal: | ||
316 | |||
317 | int bus_create_file(struct bus_type *, struct bus_attribute *); | ||
318 | void bus_remove_file(struct bus_type *, struct bus_attribute *); | ||
319 | |||
320 | |||
321 | - device drivers (include/linux/device.h) | ||
322 | ----------------------------------------- | ||
323 | |||
324 | Structure: | ||
325 | |||
326 | struct driver_attribute { | ||
327 | struct attribute attr; | ||
328 | ssize_t (*show)(struct device_driver *, char * buf); | ||
329 | ssize_t (*store)(struct device_driver *, const char * buf); | ||
330 | }; | ||
331 | |||
332 | Declaring: | ||
333 | |||
334 | DRIVER_ATTR(_name,_mode,_show,_store) | ||
335 | |||
336 | Creation/Removal: | ||
337 | |||
338 | int driver_create_file(struct device_driver *, struct driver_attribute *); | ||
339 | void driver_remove_file(struct device_driver *, struct driver_attribute *); | ||
340 | |||
341 | |||