Embedded Linux Kernel and Drivers

EmbeddedLinuxdevelopment
EmbeddedLinuxkernelanddriverdevelopment MarcoStornelli
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Courseprerequisites
Skillstomaketheselecturesprofitable FamiliaritywithUnixconceptsanditscommandlineinterface Essentialtomanipulatesourcesandfiles Essentialtounderstandanddebugthesystemthatyoubuild ExperiencewithCprogramming OnlineCcoursescanbefoundon http://dmoz.org/Computers/Programming/Languages/C/Tutorials/
Contents(1)
Kerneloverview Linuxfeatures Kernelcode Kernelsubsystems Linuxversioningschemeanddevelopmentprocess Legalissues Kerneluserinterface
Contents(2)
Compilingandbooting Linuxkernelsources Kernelsourcemanagers Kernelconfiguration Crosscompilingthekernel Overallsystemstartup Bootloaders Linuxdevicefiles Basicdriverdevelopment Loadablekernelmodules Moduleparameters Addingsourcestothetree
Contents(3)
Driverdevelopment Memorymanagement I/Omemoryandports Characterdrivers Debugging Processesandscheduling Sleeping,Interruptmanagement Handlingconcurrency mmap,DMA Asyncoperations
Contents(4)
Driverdevelopment Newdevicemodel,sysfs udev,mdevandhotplug Adviceandresources Gettinghelpandcontributions Bugreportandpatchsubmission References
Contents(5)
Annexes Kernelsources Slabcachesandmemorypools Ubootdetails Initrunlevels EmbeddedDistributionsandTools EmbeddedFilesystems
EmbeddedLinuxdriverdevelopment
Kerneloverview
Linuxfeatures
10
Studiedkernelversion:2.6
Linux2.6 Linux2.6.0wasreleasedinDecember2003. Lotsoffeaturesandnewdrivers havebeenaddedataquickpacesincethen. Itisgettingmoreandmoredifficulttogetsupportordrivers forrecenthardwarein2.4.Nocommunitysupportatall! ThesetrainingslidesarecompliantwithLinux2.6.32. It'sbesttostarttolearnaboutthemostrecentfeaturesand updates!
11
Linuxkernelkeyfeatures
Portabilityandhardwaresupport Runsonmostarchitectures. Scalability Canrunonsupercomputersas wellasontinydevices (8MBofRAMisenough). Compliancetostandardsand interoperability. Exhaustivenetworkingsupport. Security Itcan'thideitsflaws.Itscodeis reviewedbymanyexperts. Stabilityandreliability. Modularity Canincludeonlywhatasystem needsevenatruntime. Easytoprogram Youcanlearnfromexistingcode. Manyusefulresourcesonthenet.
12
Supportedhardwarearchitectures
Seethearch/directoryinthekernelsources Minimum:32bitprocessors,withorwithoutMMU 32bitarchitectures(arch/subdirectories) alpha,arm,avr32,blackfin,cris,frv,h8300,m32r,m68k, m68knommu,mn10300,mips,parisc,powerpc,s390,sh, sparc,um,x86,xtensa,microblaze,S+core 64bitarchitectures: ia64,mips,powerpc,sh64,sparc64,x86_64,parisc,s390 Seearch/<arch>/Kconfig,arch/<arch>/README,or Documentation/<arch>/fordetails
13
Kerneloverview
Kernelcode
14
ImplementedinC
ImplementedinClikeallUnixsystems. (CwascreatedtoimplementthefirstUnixsystems) AlittleAssemblyisusedtoo: CPUandmachineinitialization,exceptions, andcriticallibraryroutines. Seehttp://www.tux.org/lkml/#s153 forreasonsfornotusingC++ (mainreason:thekernelrequiresefficientcode).
15
Programminglanguagesinthekernelsources
Linux2.6.32reportbySLOCCount(http://dwheeler.com/sloccount/)
Totalsgroupedbylanguage(dominantlanguagefirst): ansic:7680247(96.91%) asm:225175(2.84%) perl:9015(0.11%) sh:3404(0.04%) yacc:2964(0.04%) lex:1824(0.02%) cpp:1795(0.02%) python:493(0.01%) awk:109(0.00%) sed:30(0.00%) Totallinesofcode:7925056
16
CompiledwithGNUC
NeedGNUCextensionstocompilethekernel. So,youcannotuseanyANSICcompiler! YoucanalsousetheIntelandMarvellcompilers(onlyontheir respectiveplatforms)whichidentifythemselvesasaGNUcompiler. SomeGNUCextensionsusedinthekernel: InlineCfunctions Inlineassembly Structurememberinitializationinanyorder(alsoinANSIC99) Branchannotation(seenextpage)
17
Helpgcctooptimizeyourcode!
Usethelikelyandunlikelystatements (include/linux/compiler.h) Example: if(unlikely(err)){ ... } TheGNUCcompilerwillmakeyourcodefaster forthemostlikelycase. Usedinmanyplacesinkernelcode! Don'tforgettousethesestatements!
18
NoClibrary
Thekernelhastobestandaloneandcan'tuseuserspacecode. Userspaceisimplementedontopofkernelservices,nottheopposite. Kernelcodehastosupplyitsownlibraryimplementations (stringutilities,cryptography,uncompression...) So,youcan'tusestandardClibraryfunctionsinkernelcode. (printf(),memset(),malloc()...). YoucanalsousekernelCheaders. Fortunately,thekernelprovidessimilarCfunctionsforyour convenience,likeprintk(),memset(),kmalloc()...
19
Managingendianism
Linuxsupportsbothlittleandbigendianarchitectures Eacharchitecturedefines__BIG_ENDIANor__LITTLE_ENDIAN in<asm/byteorder.h> Canbeconfiguredinsomeplatformssupportingboth. Tomakeyourcodeportable,thekerneloffersconversionmacros (thatdonothingwhennoconversionisneeded).Mostusefulones: u32cpu_to_be32(u32); //CPUbyteordertobigendian u32cpu_to_le32(u32); //CPUbyteordertolittleendian u32b32_to_cpu(u32); //BigendiantoCPUbyteorder u32le32_to_cpu(u32); //LittleendiantoCPUbyteorder
20
Kernelcodingguidelines
Neverusefloatingpointnumbersinkernelcode.Yourcode mayberunonaprocessorwithoutafloatingpointunit(likeon arm).Floatingpointcanbeemulatedbythekernel,butthisis veryslow. Defineallsymbolsasstatic,exceptexportedones (toavoidnamespacepollution) SeeDocumentation/codingStyleformoreguidelines
21
Kerneloverview
Kernelsubsystems
22
Kernelarchitecture
App1 App2 Clibrary Systemcallinterface Process management Memory management Filesystem support Filesystem types CPUsupport code CPU/MMU supportcode Storage drivers Character devicedrivers Network devicedrivers Hardware CPU RAM Storage Device control Networking ... User space
Kernel space
23
Kernelmemoryconstraints
Whocanlookafterthekernel? Nomemoryprotection Accessingillegalmemory locationsresultin(oftenfatal) kerneloopses. Fixedsizestack(8or4KB) Unlikeinuserspace, nowaytomakeitgrow. Kernelmemorycan'tbeswapped out(forthesamereasons).
User User process process Attempt toaccess
SIGSEGV,kill
Kernel Illegal memory location Exception (MMU) Userspacememorymanagement Usedtoimplement: memoryprotection stackgrowth memoryswappingtodisk demandpaging
24
I/Oschedulers
MissionofI/Oschedulers:reorderreadsandwritestodiskto minimizediskheadmoves(timeconsuming!)
Slower
Faster
Notneededinembeddedsystemswithnoharddisks (dataaccesstimeindependentoflocationonflashstorage) BuildyourkernelwithnoopI/Oschedulerthen!

25
Kerneloverview
Linuxversioningschemeanddevelopmentprocess
26
Until2.6(1)
Onestablemajorbranchevery2or3years Identifiedbyanevenmiddlenumber Examples:1.0,2.0,2.2,2.4 Onedevelopmentbranchtointegratenewfunctionalitiesandmajor changes Identifiedbyanoddmiddlenumber Examples:2.1,2.3,2.5 Aftersometime,adevelopmentversionbecomesthenewbase versionforthestablebranch Minorreleasesonceinwhile:2.2.23,2.5.12,etc.
27
Until2.6(2)
Stableversion 2.4.0 2.4.1 2.4.2 2.4.3 2.4.4 2.4.5 2.4.6 2.4.7 2.4.8
2.5.0
2.5.1 2.5.2
2.5.3
2.5.4
2.6.0
2.6.1 Stable
Development
Note:inreality,manymoreminor versionsexistinsidethestableand developmentbranches

28
ChangessinceLinux2.6(1)
Since2.6.0,kerneldevelopershavebeenabletointroducelots ofnewfeaturesonebyoneonasteadypace,withouthavingto makemajorchangesinexistingsubsystems. OpeninganewLinux2.7(or2.9)developmentbranchwillbe requiredonlywhenLinux2.6isnolongerabletoaccommodate keyfeatureswithoutundergoingtraumaticchanges. Thankstothis,morefeaturesarereleasedtousersatafasterpace.
29
ChangessinceLinux2.6(2)
Since2.6.14,thekerneldevelopersagreedonthefollowingdevelopmentmodel Afterthereleaseofa2.6.xversion,atwoweeksmergewindowopens, duringwhichmajoradditionsaremerged Themergewindowisclosed bythereleaseoftestversion2.6.(x+1)rc1 Thebugfixingperiodopens,forsixtotenweeks Atregularintervalsduringthebugfixingperiod, 2.6.(x+1)rcYtestversionsarereleased Whenconsideredsufficientlystable, kernel2.6.(x+1)isreleased,andtheprocessstartsagain
30
Mergeandbugfixingwindows
2weeks
Mergewindow 2.6.21 2.6.22rc1 2.6.22rc2
6to10weeks
Bugfixingperiod 2.6.22rc3 2.6.22rc4 2.6.22rc5 2.6.22
31
NostableLinuxinternalAPI(1)
Ofcourse,theexternalAPImustnotchange(systemcalls,/proc,/sys),asit couldbreakexistingprograms.Newfeaturescanbeadded,butkerneldeveloperstry tokeepbackwardcompatibilitywithearlierversions,atleastfor1orseveralyears. TheinternalkernelAPIcannowundergochangesbetweentwo2.6.xreleases.A standalonedrivercompiledforagivenversionmaynolongercompileorworkona morerecentone. SeeDocumentation/stable_api_nonsense.txt inkernelsourcesforreasonswhy. WheneveradeveloperchangesaninternalAPI,(s)healsohastoupdateallkernel codewhichusesit.Nothingbroken! Worksgreatforcodeinthemainlinekerneltree. Difficulttokeepinlineforoutoftreeorclosedsourcedrivers!
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NostableLinuxinternalAPI(2)
USBexample LinuxhasupdateditsUSBinternalAPIatleast3times(fixes,security issues,supportforhighspeeddevices)andhasnowthefastestUSBbus speeds(comparedtoothersystems) WindowsXPalsohadtorewriteitsUSBstack3times.But,becauseof closedsource,binarydriversthatcan'tbeupdated,theyhadtokeep backwardcompatibilitywithallearlierimplementation.Thisisverycostly (development,security,stability,performance). SeeMyths,Lies,andTruthsabouttheLinuxKernel,byGregK.H.,for detailsaboutthekerneldevelopmentprocess: http://kroah.com/log/linux/ols_2006_keynote.html
33
Morestabilityforthe2.6kerneltree
Issue:securityfixesonlyreleasedforlast(orlasttwo)stable kernelversions,andofcoursebydistributionsfortheexact versionthatyou'reusing. Somepeopleneedtohavearecentkernel,butwithlongterm supportforsecurityupdates.
34
What'snewineachLinuxrelease?(1)
commit 3c92c2ba33cd7d666c5f83cc32aa590e794e91b0 Author: Andi Kleen <ak@suse.de> Date: Tue Oct 11 01:28:33 2005 +0200 [PATCH] i386: Don't discard upper 32bits of HWCR on K8 Need to use long long, not long when RMWing a MSR. I think it's harmless right now, but still should be better fixed if AMD adds any bits in the upper 32bit of HWCR. Bug was introduced with the TLB flush filter fix for i386 Signed-off-by: Andi Kleen <ak@suse.de> Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
? ?!
...
TheofficiallistofchangesforeachLinuxreleaseisjusta hugelistofindividualpatches! Verydifficulttofindoutthekeychangesandtogetthe globalpictureoutofindividualchanges.

35
What'snewineachLinuxrelease?(2)
Fortunately,asummaryofkeychanges withenoughdetailsisavailableon http://wiki.kernelnewbies.org/LinuxChanges
? ?!
Foreachnewkernelrelease,youcanalsogetthe changesinthekernelinternalAPI: http://lwn.net/Articles/2.6kernelapi/ What'snext? Documentation/featureremovalschedule.txt liststhefeatures,subsystemsandAPIsthatare plannedforremoval(announced1yearinadvance).
36
Kerneloverview
Legalissues
37
Linuxlicense
ThewholeLinuxsourcesareFreeSoftwarereleased undertheGNUGeneralPublicLicenseversion2(GPLv2). Seehttp://freeelectrons.com/articles/freesw/trainingfor detailsaboutFreeSoftwareanditslicenses.
38
Linuxkernellicensingconstraints
Constraintsatreleasetime(noconstraintbefore!) ForanydeviceembeddingLinuxandFreeSoftware,youhavetoreleasesources totheenduser.Youhavenoobligationtoreleasethemtoanybodyelse! AccordingtotheGPL,onlyLinuxdrivers withaGPLcompatiblelicenseareallowed. Proprietarydriversarelessandlesstolerated. Lawyerssaythattheyareillegal. Proprietarydriversmustnotbestaticallycompiledintothekernel. Youarenotallowedtoreusecodefromotherkerneldrivers(GPL) inaproprietarydriver.
39
AdvantagesofGPLdrivers
Fromthedriverdeveloper/decisionmakerpointofview
Youdon'thavetowriteyourdriver fromscratch.Youcanreusecodefrom similarfreesoftwaredrivers. Yougetfreecommunitycontributions, support,codereviewandtesting. Proprietarydrivers(evenwithsources) don'tgetany. Yourdriverscanbefreelyshippedby others(mainlybydistributions). Closedsourcedriversoftensupporta givenkernelversion.Asystemwith closedsourcedriversfrom2different sourcesisunmanageable. Usersandthecommunitygetapositive imageofyourcompany.Makesit easiertohiretalenteddevelopers. Youdon'thavetosupplybinarydriver releasesforeachkernelversionand patchversion(closedsourcedrivers). Drivershaveallprivileges.Youneed thesourcestomakesurethatadriver isnotasecurityrisk. Yourdriverscanbestaticallycompiled intothekernel.
40
Advantagesofintreekerneldrivers
Advantagesofhavingyourdriversinthemainlinekernelsources Onceyoursourcesareacceptedinthemainlinetree,theyare maintainedbypeoplemakingchanges. Costfreemaintenance,securityfixesandimprovements. Easyaccesstoyoursourcesbyusers. Manymorepeoplereviewingyourcode.
41
LegalproprietaryLinuxdrivers(1)
WorkingaroundtheGPLbycreatingaGPLwrapper:
Wrapper SpecialAPI
Linuxkernel
Binary Binary blob blob (proprietary (proprietary driver) driver)
Theproprietaryblobisnotbrokenwhenyourecompileorupdatethe kerneland/ordriver.Hence,theproprietarydrivermaynotbeconsideredas aderivativework.However,thekernelismonolithicandtheblobstill belongstoasingleexecutable.Thisisstillcontroversial!

42
LegalproprietaryLinuxdrivers(2)
2examplecases Nvidiagraphiccarddrivers Supportingwirelessnetworkcards usingWindowsdrivers. TheNdisWrapperproject (http://ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net/) implementstheWindowskernelAPI andNDIS(NetworkDriverInterface Spec.)APIwithintheLinuxkernel. Usefulforusingcardsforwhichno specificationsarereleased. Drawbacks Stillsomemaintenanceissues. Example:Nvidiaproprietarydriver incompatiblewithX.org7.1. Performanceissues. Wrapperoverheadandoptimizationsnot available. Securityissues.Thedriversareexecuted withfullkernelprivileges. ...andallotherissueswithproprietary drivers.UserslosemostbenefitsofFree Software.
43
Softwarepatentissuesinthekernel
LinuxKerneldriverissuesbecauseofpatentedalgorithms Checkforsoftwarepatentwarningswhenyouconfigureyourkernel!
Patentwarningsissuedinthe documentationofdrivers,showninthe kernelconfigurationinterface. FlashTranslationLayer drivers/mtd/ftl.c IntheUSA,thisdrivercanonlybe usedonPCMCIAhardware (MSystemspatent). NandFlashTranslationLayer IntheUSA,canonlybeusedon DiskOnChiphardware. Networkingcompression drivers/net/bsd_comp.c Can'tsendaCCPresetrequestasa resultofanerrordetectedafter decompression(Motorolapatent). OtherdriversnotacceptedinLinux releasesoralgorithmsnot implementedbecauseofsuchpatents! Otherwise,moreexampleswouldbe availableinthesourcecode.
44
Kerneloverview
Kerneluserinterface
45
Mountingvirtualfilesystems
Linuxmakessystemandkernelinformationavailableinuser spacethroughvirtualfilesystems(virtualfilesnotexistingonany realstorage).Noneedtoknowkernelprogrammingtoaccessthis!
Mounting/proc: sudomounttprocnone/proc Mounting/sys: sudomounttsysfsnone/sys

Filesystemtype Mountpoint Rawdevice orfilesystemimage Inthecaseofvirtual filesystems,anystringisfine
46
Kerneluserspaceinterface
Afewexamples: /proc/cpuinfo:processorinformation /proc/meminfo:memorystatus /proc/version:kernelversionandbuildinformation /proc/cmdline:kernelcommandline /proc/<pid>/environ:callingenvironment /proc/<pid>/cmdline:processcommandline ...andmanymore!Seebyyourself!
47
Userspaceinterfacedocumentation
Lotsofdetailsaboutthe/procinterfaceareavailablein Documentation/filesystems/proc.txt (almost2000lines)inthekernelsources. Youcanalsofindotherdetailsintheprocmanualpage: manproc SeetheNewDeviceModelsectionfordetailsabout/sys
48
Userspacedevicedrivers(1)
Possibletoimplementdevicedriversinuserspace! Suchdriversjustneedaccesstothedevicesthrough minimum,generickerneldrivers. Examples: Printerandscannerdrivers (ontopofgenericparallelport/USBdrivers) Xdrivers:lowlevelkerneldrivers+userspaceXdrivers. Userspacedriversintroducedin2.6.23.
49
Userspacedevicedrivers(2)
Advantages Noneedforkernelcodingskills.Easiertoreusecodebetweendevices. Driverscanbewritteninanylanguage,evenPerl! Driverscanbekeptproprietary. Drivercodecanbekilledanddebugged.Cannotcrashthekernel. Canbeswappedout(kernelcodecannotbe). Canusefloatingpointcomputation. Lessinkernelcomplexity. Drawbacks Lessstraightforwardtohandleinterrupts. Increasedlatencyvs.kernelcode. SeeUIOHowtointhekerneldocumentationfordetailedinformationsandthe UsingUIOonanEmbeddedplatformtalkatELC2008, http://www.celinux.org/elc08_presentations/uio080417celfelc08.pdf.
50
CompilingandbootingLinux
Linuxkernelsources
51
kernel.org
Downloadkernel sourcesfrom http://kernel.org
52
Linuxsourcesstructure(1)
arch/<arch>
Architecturespecificcode arch/<arch>/mach<mach> Machine/boardspecificcode block/ Blocklayercore COPYING Linuxcopyingconditions(GNUGPL) CREDITS Linuxmaincontributors crypto/ Cryptographiclibraries Documentation/ Kerneldocumentation.Don'tmissit! drivers/ Alldevicedriversexceptsoundones fs/ Filesystems(fs/ext3/,etc.) include/ Kernelheaders include/asm<arch> Architectureandmachinedependentheaders include/linux Linuxkernelcoreheaders init/ Linuxinitialization(includingmain.c) firmware/ Firmwaresneededtoworkwithdrivers virt/ Codeforvirtualizationsupport tools/ Performacemonitor/countertools
53
Linuxsourcesstructure(2)
ipc/ Kbuild kernel/ lib/ MAINTAINERS Makefile mm/ net/ README REPORTINGBUGS samples/ scripts/ security/ sound/ usr/ Codeusedforprocesscommunication Partofthekernelbuildsystem Linuxkernelcore(verysmall!) Misclibraryroutines(zlib,crc32...) Maintainersofeachkernelpart.Veryuseful! TopLinuxmakefile(setsarchandversion) Memorymanagementcode(smalltoo!) Networksupportcode(notdrivers) Overviewandbuildinginstructions Bugreportinstructions Examplekernelmodules Scriptsforinternalorexternaluse Securitymodelimplementations(SELinux...) Soundsupportcodeanddrivers Codetogenerateaninitramfscpioarchive
54
Linuxkernelsize(1)
Linux2.6.32sources: Rawsize:349MB(approx8millionlinesofcode) gzipcompressedtararchive:75MB bzip2compressedtararchive:61MB(better) MinimumcompiledLinuxkernelsize(withLinuxTinypatches) approx300KB(compressed),800KB(raw)(Linux2.6.14) Whyarethesesourcessobig? Becausetheyincludethousandsofdevicedrivers,manynetworkprotocols, supportmanyarchitecturesandfilesystems... TheLinuxcore(scheduler,memorymanagement...)isprettysmall!
55
Linuxkernelsize(2)
SizeofLinux2.6.32sourcedirectories(KB)
drivers arch fs sound net include Documentation firmware kernel mm scripts crypto security lib tools block ipc virt init samples usr 0 20000 40000 60000 80000 100000 120000 140000 160000 180000 200000
56
GettingLinuxsources:2possibilities
Fullsources Theeasiestway,butlongertodownload. Example: http://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/linux2.6.28.1.tar.bz2 Orpatchagainstthepreviousversion Assumingyoualreadyhavethefullsourcesofthepreviousversion Example: http://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/patch2.6.28.bz2(2.6.27to2.6.28) http://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/patch2.6.28.1.bz2(2.6.28to2.6.28.1)
57
Downloadingfullkernelsources
Downloadingfromthecommandline Withawebbrowser,identifytheversionyouneedonhttp://kernel.org Intherightdirectory,downloadthesourcearchiveanditssignature (copyingthedownloadaddressfromthebrowser):
wgethttp://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/linux2.6.11.12.tar.bz2
Extractthecontentsofthesourcearchive:
tarjxflinux2.6.11.12.tar.bz2
~/.wgetrcconfigfileforproxies: ~/.wgetrcconfigfileforproxies:
http_proxy=<proxy>:<port> http_proxy=<proxy>:<port> ftp_proxy=<proxy>:<port> ftp_proxy=<proxy>:<port> proxy_user=<user>(ifany) proxy_user=<user>(ifany) proxy_password=<passwd>(ifany) proxy_password=<passwd>(ifany)
58
Downloadingkernelsourcepatches(1)
Assumingyoualreadyhavethelinuxx.y.<n1>version Identifythepatchesyouneedonhttp://kernel.orgwithawebbrowser Downloadthepatchfilesandtheirsignature:
Patchfrom2.6.10to2.6.11
wgetftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/patch2.6.11.bz2
Patchfrom2.6.11to2.6.11.12(lateststablefixes)
wgethttp://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/patch2.6.11.12.bz2
59
Downloadingkernelsourcepatches(2)
Applythepatchesintherightorder:
cdlinux2.6.10/ bzcat../patch2.6.11.bz2|patchp1 bzcat../patch2.6.11.12.bz2|patchp1 cd.. mvlinux2.6.10linux2.6.11.12
60
Anatomyofapatchfile
Apatchfileistheoutputofthediffcommand
diffcommandline diffNrua/Makefileb/Makefile a/Makefile2008120409:25:1708:00 Filedateinfo +++b/Makefile2008120409:27:1508:00 @@1,7+1,7@@ Linenumbersinfiles VERSION=2 Contextinfo:3linesbeforethechange PATCHLEVEL=6 Usefultoapplyapatchwhenlinenumberschanged SUBLEVEL=27 EXTRAVERSION= Removedline(s)ifany +EXTRAVERSION=.1 Addedline(s)ifany
61
Usingthepatchcommand
Thepatchcommandapplieschangestofilesinthecurrentdirectory: Makingchangestoexistingfiles Creatingordeletingfilesanddirectories patchusageexamples: patchp<n><diff_file catdiff_file|patchp<n> bzcatdiff_file.bz2|patchp<n> zcatdiff_file.gz|patchp<n> n:numberofdirectorylevelstoskipinthefilepaths
Youcanreverse Youcanreverse apatch apatch withtheR withtheR option option
Youcantestapatchwith Youcantestapatchwith thedryrun thedryrun option option
62
ApplyingaLinuxpatch
Linuxpatches... Alwaystoapplytothex.y.<z1>version Downloadableingzip andbzip2(muchsmaller)compressedfiles. Alwaysproducedforn=1 (that'swhateverybodydoes...doittoo!) Linuxpatchcommandlineexample: cdlinux2.6.10 bzcat../patch2.6.11.bz2|patchp1 cd..;mvlinux2.6.10linux2.6.11 Youcanmakepatch30% Youcanmakepatch30% fasterbyusingsp1 fasterbyusingsp1 insteadofp1 insteadofp1 (silent) (silent)
Testedonpatch2.6.23.bz2
Keeppatchfilescompressed:usefultochecktheirsignaturelater. Youcanstillview(orevenedit)theuncompresseddatawithvi: vipatch2.6.11.bz2(onthefly(un)compression)
63
Accessingdevelopmentsources(1)
Kerneldevelopmentsourcesarenowmanagedwithgit: http://kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/ YoucanbrowseLinus'gittree(ifyoujustneedtocheckafewfiles): http://www.kernel.org/git/?p=linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux2.6.git;a=tree Ifyouarebehindaproxy,setUnixenvironmentvariablesdefiningproxy settings.Example: exporthttp_proxy="proxy.server.com:8080" exportftp_proxy="proxy.server.com:8080"
64
Accessingdevelopmentsources(2)
Pickupagitdevelopmenttreeonhttp://git.kernel.org/ Getalocalcopy(clone)ofthistree. Example(Linustree,theoneusedforLinuxstablereleases):
gitclonegit://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux2.6.git
Updateyourcopywheneverneeded(Linustreeexample):
cdlinux2.6 gitpullgit://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux2.6.git
Moredetailsavailable onhttp://git.or.cz/orhttp://linux.yyz.us/githowto.html
65
Kernelsourcemanagementtools
66
Cscope
http://cscope.sourceforge.net/ Tooltobrowsesourcecode (mainlyC,butalsoC++orJava) SupportshugeprojectsliketheLinuxkernel Takeslessthan1min.toindexLinux2.6.17 sources(fast!) Canbeusedfromeditorslikevimandemacs. InLinuxkernelsources,runitwith: makeARCH=<arch>cscope
Allowssearchingcodefor: Allowssearchingcodefor: allreferencestoasymbol allreferencestoasymbol globaldefinitions globaldefinitions functionscalledbyafunction functionscalledbyafunction functionscallingafunction functionscallingafunction textstring textstring regularexpressionpattern regularexpressionpattern afile afile filesincludingafile filesincludingafile
67
Cscopescreenshot
68
KScope
http://kscope.sourceforge.net AgraphicalfrontendtoCscope MakesiteasytobrowseandedittheLinuxkernelsources Candisplayafunctioncalltree Niceeditingfeatures:symbolcompletion,spellingchecker, automaticindentation... Usageguidelines: UsetheKernelsettingtoignorestandardCincludes. Makesuretheprojectnamedoesn'tcontainblankcharacters!
69
KScopescreenshots(1)
Symbols incurrent file Mainwindow
Project files
Querywindow
70
KScopescreenshots(2)
Calledfunctionstree
71
LXR:LinuxCrossReference
http://sourceforge.net/projects/lxr Genericsourceindexingtool andcodebrowser Webserverbased Veryeasyandfasttouse Identifierortextsearchavailable Veryeasytofindthedeclaration, implementationorusagesofsymbols SupportsCandC++ Supportshugecodeprojects suchastheLinuxkernel (264Minversion2.6.26). Takessometimeandpatiencetosetup (configuration,indexing,server configuration). Initialindexingveryslow: Linux2.6.17:severalhoursonaserver withanAMDSempron2200+CPU. UsingKscopeistheeasiestandfastest solutionformodifiedkernelsources.
Youdon'tneedtosetupLXRby yourself. Useourhttp://lxr.freeelectrons.com server! OtherserversavailableontheInternet: http://freeelectrons.com/community/kernel/l ThismakesLXRthesimplestsolution tobrowsestandardkernelsources.
72
LXRscreenshot
73
KetchupEasyaccesstokernelsourcetrees
http://www.selenic.com/ketchup/wiki/ Makesiteasytogetthelatestversionofagivenkernelsourcetree (2.4,2.6,2.6rc,2.6git,2.6mm,2.6rt...) Onlydownloadstheneededpatches. Revertspatcheswhenneededtoapplyamorerecentpatch. Alsochecksthesignatureofsourcesandpatches.
74
Ketchupexamples
Gettheversioninthecurrentdirectory: >ketchupm 2.6.10 Upgradetothelateststableversion: >ketchupG2.6tip 2.6.10>2.6.12.5 Applyingpatch2.6.11.bz2 Applyingpatch2.6.12.bz2 Applyingpatch2.6.12.5.bz2 Youcangetbackto2.6.8: >ketchupG2.6.8 TheGoptionofketchup TheGoptionofketchup disablessourcesignature disablessourcesignature checking. checking. SeeKernelsourcesannex SeeKernelsourcesannex fordetailsaboutenabling fordetailsaboutenabling kernelsource kernelsource integritychecking. integritychecking.
Moreonhttp://selenic.com/ketchup/wiki/index.cgi/ExampleUsage
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Kernelconfiguration
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Kernelconfiguration
Defineswhatfeaturestoincludeinthekernel: Storedinthe.configfileattherootofkernelsources. Mostusefulcommandstocreatethisconfigfile: make[xconfig|gconfig|menuconfig|oldconfig] TomodifyakernelinaGNU/Linuxdistribution: configfilesusuallyreleasedin/boot/,togetherwithkernelimages: /boot/config2.6.1711generic Theconfigurationfilecanalsobefoundinthekernelitself: >zcat/proc/config.gz (ifenabledinGeneralSetup>Kernel.configsupport)
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makexconfig
makexconfig NewQtconfigurationinterfaceforLinux2.6:qconf. MucheasiertousethaninLinux2.4! Makesureyouread help>introduction:usefuloptions! Filebrowser:easiertoloadconfigurationfiles Newsearchinterfacetolookforparameters
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makexconfigscreenshot
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makexconfigsearchinterface
Looksforakeyword inthedescriptionstring Allowstoselectorun selectfoundparameters.
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Kernelconfigurationoptions
Compiledasamodule(separatefile) CONFIG_ISO9660_FS=m
Driveroptions CONFIG_JOLIET=y CONFIG_ZISOFS=y
Compiledstaticallyintothekernel CONFIG_UDF_FS=y
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Corresponding.configfileexcerpt
# #CDROM/DVDFilesystems # CONFIG_ISO9660_FS=m CONFIG_JOLIET=y CONFIG_ZISOFS=y CONFIG_UDF_FS=y CONFIG_UDF_NLS=y
Sectionname (helpstolocatesettingsintheinterface)
Allparametersareprefixed withCONFIG_
# #DOS/FAT/NTFilesystems # #CONFIG_MSDOS_FSisnotset #CONFIG_VFAT_FSisnotset CONFIG_NTFS_FS=m #CONFIG_NTFS_DEBUGisnotset CONFIG_NTFS_RW=y

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makegconfig
makegconfig NewGTKbasedgraphical configurationinterface. Functionalitysimilartothat ofmakexconfig. Justlackingasearch functionality.
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makemenuconfig
makemenuconfig Sameoldtextinterface asinLinux2.4. Usefulwhennographics areavailable.Pretty convenienttoo! Sameinterfacefoundin othertools:BusyBox, buildroot...
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makeoldconfig
makeoldconfig Neededveryoften! Usefultoupgradea.configfilefromanearlierkernel release. Issueswarningsforobsoletesymbols. Asksforvaluesfornewsymbols. Ifyouedita.configfilebyhand,it'sstronglyrecommended torunmakeoldconfigafterwards!
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makeallnoconfig
makeallnoconfig Onlysetsstronglyrecommendedsettingstoy. Setsallothersettingston. Veryusefulinembeddedsystemstoselectonlytheminimum requiredsetoffeaturesanddrivers. Muchmoreconvenientthanunselectinghundredsoffeatures onebyone!
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makelocalmodconfig
makelocalmodconfig Itperformsthefollowingsteps:
Itruns"lsmod"tofindallthemodulesloadedonthecurrent runningsystemanditwillreadalltheMakefilestomapwhich CONFIGenablesamodule; itreadstheKconfigfilestofindthedependenciesandselects thatmaybeneededtosupportaCONFIG. itreadsthe.configfileandremovesanymodule"=m"thatis notneededtoenablethecurrentlyloadedmodules.
There'sanadditional"makelocalyesconfig"target,incase youdon'twanttousemodulesand/orinitrds.
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Cloningaconfigfile
Wecaninsertinthekerneltheconfigfileenablinga configurationoption. Toextracttheinformationfromakernelimagewecanuse scripts/extractikconfigscript. Wecanuse(ifenabled)/proc/config.gz. Inthiswaywecanalwaysknowtheconfigurationofa runningkernel!
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Undoingconfigurationchanges
Afrequentproblem: Afterchangingseveralkernelconfigurationsettings, yourkernelnolongerworks. Ifyoudon'trememberallthechangesyoumade, youcangetbacktoyourpreviousconfiguration: >cp.config.old.config Alltheconfigurationinterfacesofthekernel (xconfig,menuconfig,allnoconfig...) keepthis.config.oldbackupcopy.
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makehelp
makehelp Listsallavailablemaketargets. Usefultogetareminder,ortolookforneworadvanced options!
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Customizingtheversionstring
Toidentifyyourkernelimagewithothersbuiltfromthesame sources(butadifferentconfiguration),usethe LOCALVERSIONsetting(inGeneralSetup). Example: # #Generalsetup # CONFIG_LOCALVERSION="acme1" Theunamercommand(intherunningsystem)willreturn: 2.6.20acme1
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Crosscompilingthekernel
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Crosscompilingthekernel
WhenyoucompileaLinuxkernelforanotherCPUarchitecture Muchfasterthancompilingnatively,whenthetargetsystemis muchslowerthanyourGNU/Linuxworkstation. MucheasierasdevelopmenttoolsforyourGNU/Linux workstationaremucheasiertofind. Tomakethedifferencewithanativecompiler,crosscompiler executablesareprefixedbythenameofthetargetsystem, architectureandsometimeslibrary.Examples: mipslinuxgcc m68klinuxuclibcgcc armlinuxgnueabigcc
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Specifyingacrosscompiler(1)
TheCPUarchitectureandcrosscompilerprefixaredefinedthroughthe ARCHandCROSS_COMPILEvariablesinthetoplevelMakefile. TheMakefiledefinesCC=$(CROSS_COMPILE)gcc SeecommentsinMakefilefordetails TheeasiestsolutionistomodifytheMakefile. Example,ARMplatform,crosscompiler:armlinuxgcc ARCH ?=arm CROSS_COMPILE ?=armlinux
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AnothersolutionistosetARCHandCROSS_COMPILE throughthemakecommandline Explanation:anyvariablesetthroughthemakecommandline overridesanysettingintheMakefile. Examples:
makeARCH=armCROSS_COMPILE=armlinuxxconfig makeARCH=armCROSS_COMPILE=armlinux makeARCH=armCROSS_COMPILE=armlinuxmodules_install
Bigdrawback: Youshouldneverforgetthesesettingswhenyourunmake! That'serrorproneandnotconvenientatall.
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Anothersolution:setARCHandCROSS_COMPILE
asenvironmentvariablesinyourterminal: exportARCH=arm exportCROSS_COMPILE=armlinux Canbesetinprojectspecificenvironments. NothardcodedintheMakefile. Donotinterferewithpatches. Youdon'tforgettosetthemwhenyourunanymakecommand. Caution:onlyapplytoshells inwhichthesevariableshavebeenset.
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Readymadeconfigfiles
assabet_defconfigintegrator_defconfigmainstone_defconfig assabet_defconfigintegrator_defconfigmainstone_defconfig badge4_defconfigiq31244_defconfigmx1ads_defconfig badge4_defconfigiq31244_defconfigmx1ads_defconfig bast_defconfigiq80321_defconfigneponset_defconfig bast_defconfigiq80321_defconfigneponset_defconfig cerfcube_defconfigiq80331_defconfignetwinder_defconfig cerfcube_defconfigiq80331_defconfignetwinder_defconfig clps7500_defconfigiq80332_defconfigomap_h2_1610_defconfig clps7500_defconfigiq80332_defconfigomap_h2_1610_defconfig ebsa110_defconfigixdp2400_defconfigomnimeter_defconfig ebsa110_defconfigixdp2400_defconfigomnimeter_defconfig edb7211_defconfigixdp2401_defconfigpleb_defconfig edb7211_defconfigixdp2401_defconfigpleb_defconfig enp2611_defconfigixdp2800_defconfigpxa255idp_defconfig enp2611_defconfigixdp2800_defconfigpxa255idp_defconfig ep80219_defconfigixdp2801_defconfigrpc_defconfig ep80219_defconfigixdp2801_defconfigrpc_defconfig epxa10db_defconfigixp4xx_defconfigs3c2410_defconfig epxa10db_defconfigixp4xx_defconfigs3c2410_defconfig footbridge_defconfigjornada720_defconfigshannon_defconfig footbridge_defconfigjornada720_defconfigshannon_defconfig fortunet_defconfiglart_defconfigshark_defconfig fortunet_defconfiglart_defconfigshark_defconfig h3600_defconfiglpd7a400_defconfigsimpad_defconfig h3600_defconfiglpd7a400_defconfigsimpad_defconfig h7201_defconfiglpd7a404_defconfigsmdk2410_defconfig h7201_defconfiglpd7a404_defconfigsmdk2410_defconfig h7202_defconfiglubbock_defconfigversatile_defconfig h7202_defconfiglubbock_defconfigversatile_defconfig hackkit_defconfiglusl7200_defconfig hackkit_defconfiglusl7200_defconfig
arch/arm/configsexample
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Usingreadymadeconfigfiles
Defaultconfigurationfilesavailableformanyboards/machines! Checkifoneexistsinarch/<arch>/configs/foryourtarget. Example:ifyoufoundanacme_defconfigfile,youcanrun: makeacme_defconfig Usingarch/<arch>/configs/isaverygoodwayofreleasinga defaultconfigurationfileforagroupofusersordevelopers. Likeallmakecommands,youmust runmake<machine>_defconfig inthetoplevelsourcedirectory.
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Kernelcompilingtips
Viewthefull(gcc,ld...)commandline: makeV=1 Cleanupgeneratedfiles(toforcerecompilingdrivers): makeclean Removeallgeneratedfiles.Caution:alsoremovesyour.configfile! makemrproper Alsoremoveeditorbackupandpatchrejectfiles(mainlytogenerate patches): makedistclean
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Crosscompilingsetup
Example IfyouhaveanARMcrosscompilingtoolchain in/usr/local/arm/3.3.2/ YoujusthavetoaddittoyourUnixsearchpath: exportPATH=/usr/local/arm/3.3.2/bin:$PATH (Caution:thescopeofthisdefinitionislimitedtothecurrentshell). Choosingatoolchain SeetheDocumentation/Changesfileinthesources fordetailsaboutminimumtoolversionsrequirements. Moreabouttoolchains:FreeSoftwaretoolsforembeddedsystemstraining: http://freeelectrons.com/training/devtools/
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Buildingthekernel
Run make Copy arch/<arch>/boot/zImage(oruImageforUBoot) tothetargetstorage
Youcancustomizearch/<arch>/boot/install.shsothatmake installdoesthisautomaticallyforyou. makeINSTALL_MOD_PATH=<rootfsprefix> modules_install
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Dependencymanagement
Whenyoumodifyaregularkernelsourcefile,makeonly rebuildswhatneedsrecompiling.That'swhatitisusedfor. However,theMakefileisquitepessimisticabout dependencies.Whenyoumakesignificantchangestothe .configfile,don'tbesurprisedifmakeoftenrecompiles mostfiles,evenwhenitdoesn'tseemnecessary.
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Generatedfiles
Createdwhenyourunthemakecommand vmlinux RawLinuxkernelimage,noncompressed. arch/<arch>/boot/zImage zlibcompressedkernelimage (defaultimageonarm)
arch/<arch>/boot/bzImage (defaultimageoni386) Alsoazlibcompressedkernelimage. Caution:bzmeansbigzippedbutnotbzip2compressed! arch/<arch>/boot/uImage CompressedkernelimagereadytouseforUBoot.
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Filescreatedbymakemodules_install(1)
<rootfsprefix>/lib/modules/<version>/:Kernelmodules +extras build/ Everythingneededtobuildmoremodulesforthiskernel:Makefile, .configfile,modulesymbolinformation(module.symVers), kernelheaders(include/andinclude/asm/) kernel/ Module.ko(KernelObject)files,inthesamedirectorystructureasin thesources.
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Filescreatedbymakemodules_install(2)
<rootfsprefix>/lib/modules/<version>/(continued) modules.alias Modulealiasesformoduleloadingutilities.Exampleline: aliassoundservice?0snd_mixer_oss modules.dep Moduledependencies(seetheLoadablekernelmodulessection) modules.symbols Tellswhichmoduleagivensymbolbelongsto. Allthefilesinthisdirectoryaretextfiles. Don'thesitatetohavealookbyyourself!
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Compilingfasterwithccache
http://ccache.samba.org/ CompilercacheforCandC++,alreadyshippedbysomedistributions Muchfasterwhencompilingthesamefileasecondtime! Veryusefulwhen.configfilechangearefrequent. Useitbyaddingaccacheprefix totheCCandHOSTCCdefinitionsinMakefile: CC=ccache$(CROSS_COMPILE)gcc HOSTCC=ccachegcc Performancebenchmarks: 63%:withaFedoraCore3configfile(manymodules!) 82%:withanembeddedLinuxconfigfile(muchfewermodules!)
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Compilingfasteronmultiprocessorhosts
Ifyouareusingaworkstationwithnprocessors,youmayroughly divideyourcompiletimebynbycompilingseveralfilesinparallel. makej<n> Runsseveraltargetsinparallel,wheneverpossible Usingmakej2ormakej3onsingleprocessorworkstations. Thisdoesn'thelpmuch.Intheory,severalparallelcompilejobskeep theprocessorbusywhileotherprocessesarewaitingforfilestobe readofwritten.Inpractice,youdon'tgetanysignificantspeedup(not morethan10%),unlessyourI/Osareveryslow.
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Kernelheaders
Sometimeswhenwewantcrosscompileanapplicationweneed thekernelheaders,wherearethey?
makeARCH=<targetarch>INSTALL_HDR_PATH=<kernel headerpath>headers_install
Wecanuseaspath<rootfsprefix>/usr/includeand removethatfolderbeforetoinstalltherootfsinthetarget.
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Crosscompilingsummary
EditMakefile:setARCHandCROSS_COMPILE Getthedefaultconfigurationforyourmachine: make<machine>_defconfig(ifexistinginarch/<arch>/configs). Refinetheconfigurationsettingsaccordingtoyourrequirements: makexconfig AddthecrosscompilerpathtoyourPATHenvironmentvariable. Compilethekernel:make Copythekernelimagefromarch/<arch>/boot/tothetarget. Copymodulestoadirectorywhichyoureplicateonthetarget: makeINSTALL_MOD_PATH=<dir>modules_install
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Linuxdevicefiles
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Characterdevicefiles
Accessedthroughasequentialflowofindividualcharacters. Characterdevicescanbeidentifiedbytheirctype(lsl):
crwrw1rootuucp4,64Feb232004/dev/ttyS0 crww1jdoetty136,1Feb232004/dev/pts/1 crw1rootroot13,32Feb232004/dev/input/mouse0 crwrwrw1rootroot1,3Feb232004/dev/null
Exampledevices:keyboards,mice,parallelport,IrDA, Bluetoothport,consoles,terminals,sound,video...
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Blockdevicefiles
Accessedthroughdatablocksofagivensize.Blockscanbe accessedinanyorder. Blockdevicescanbeidentifiedbytheirbtype(lsl):
brwrw1rootdisk3,1Feb232004hda1 brwrw1jdoefloppy2,0Feb232004fd0 brwrw1rootdisk7,0Feb232004loop0 brwrw1rootdisk1,1Feb232004ram1 brw1rootroot8,1Feb232004sda1
Exampledevices:hardorfloppydisks,ramdisks,loopdevices...
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Devicemajorandminornumbers
Asyoucouldseeinthepreviousexamples, devicefileshave2numbersassociatedtothem: Firstnumber:majornumber. Secondnumber:minornumber. Majorandminornumbersareusedbythekerneltobindadriver tothedevicefile.Devicefilenamesdon'tmattertothekernel! Tofindoutwhichdriveradevicefilecorrespondsto, orwhenthedevicenameistoocryptic, seeDocumentation/devices.txt.
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Devicefilecreation
Devicefilesarenotcreatedwhenadriverisloaded. Theyhavetobecreatedinadvance: sudomknod/dev/<device>[c|b]<major><minor> Examples: sudomknod/dev/ttyS0c464 sudomknod/dev/hda1b31
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Overallsystemstartup
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Linux2.4bootingsequence
Bootloader
ExecutedbythehardwareatafixedlocationinROM/Flash Initializessupportforthedevicewherethekernelimageisfound(localstorage,network, removablemedia) LoadsthekernelimageinRAM Executesthekernelimage(withaspecifiedcommandline)
Kernel
Uncompressesitself Initializesthekernelcoreandstaticallycompileddrivers(neededtoaccesstherootfilesystem) Mountstherootfilesystem(specifiedbytherootkernelparameter) Executesthefirstuserspaceprogram(specifiedbytheinitkernelparameter)
Firstuserspaceprogram
Configuresuserspaceandstartsupsystemservices
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Linux2.6bootingsequence
Bootloader
Kernel
Uncompressesitself Initializesthekernelcoreandstaticallycompileddrivers Uncompressestheinitramfscpioarchiveincludedinthekernelfilecache(nomounting,nofilesystem). Iffoundintheinitramfs,executesthefirstuserspaceprogram: /init
Userspace:/initscript(whatfollowsisjustatypicalscenario)
Runsuserspacecommandstoconfigurethedevice(suchasnetworksetup,mounting /procand/sys...) Mountsanewrootfilesystem.Switchtoit( switch_root) Runs/sbin/init(orsometimesanew/linuxrcscript)
Userspace:/sbin/init
Runscommandstoconfigurethedevice(ifnotdoneyetintheinitramfs) Startsupsystemservices(daemons,servers)anduserprograms
unchanged
ExecutedbythehardwareatafixedlocationinROM/Flash Initializessupportforthedevicewheretheimagesarefound(localstorage,network,removablemedia) LoadsthekernelimageinRAM Executesthekernelimage(withaspecifiedcommandline)
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Linux2.6bootingsequencewithinitrd
Bootloader
ExecutedbythehardwareatafixedlocationinROM/Flash Initializessupportforthedevicewheretheimagesarefound(localstorage,network,removablemedia) Loadsthekernelandinitramdisk(initrd)imagesinRAM Executesthekernelimage(withaspecifiedcommandline)
Kernel
Uncompressesitself Initializesstaticallycompileddrivers Uncompressestheinitramfscpioarchiveincludedinthekernel.Mountsit.No /initexecutablefound. Sofallsbacktotheoldwayoftryingtolocateandmountarootfilesystem. Mountstherootfilesystemspecifiedbythe rootkernelparameter(initrdinourcase) Executesthefirstuserspaceprogram:usually /linuxrc
Userspace:/linuxrcscriptininitrd(whatfollowsisjustatypicalsequence)
Runsuserspacecommandstoconfigurethedevice(suchasnetworksetup,mounting /procand/sys...) Loadskernelmodules(drivers)storedintheinitrd,neededtoaccessthenewrootfilesystem. Mountsthenewrootfilesystem.Switchtoit( pivot_root) Runs/sbin/init(orsometimesanew/linuxrcscript)
Userspace:/sbin/init
Runscommandstoconfigurethedevice(ifnotdoneyetintheinitrd) Startsupsystemservices(daemons,servers)anduserprograms
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Linux2.4bootingsequencedrawbacks
Tryingtomountthefilesystemspecified bytherootkernelparameteriscomplex: Needdeviceandfilesystemdriverstobeloaded. Specifyingtherootfilesystemrequiresuglyblackmagicdevice naming(suchas/dev/ram0,/dev/hda1...),while/doesn't existyet! Canrequireacomplexinitializationtoimplementwithinthe kernel.Examples:NFS(setupanIPaddress,connecttothe server...),RAID(rootfilesystemonmultiplephysicaldrives)... Inanutshell:toomuchcomplexityinkernelcode!
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Extrainitramdiskdrawbacks(1)
Initramdisksareimplementedasstandardblockdevices Needaramdiskandfilesystemdriver. Fixedinsize:cannoteasilygrowinsize. Anyfreespacecannotbereusedbyanythingelse. Needstobecreatedandmodifiedlikeanyblockdevice: formatting,mounting,editing,unmounting. Rootpermissionsneeded. Likeinanyblockdevice,filesarefirstreadfromthestorage, andthencopiedtothefilecache. SlowandduplicationinRAM!!!
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Extrainitramdiskdrawbacks(2)
initrdisaseparetefilewhileinitramfsismanagedwiththeLinux kernelimage. initrdfileisagzippedfilesystemimage(itneedsadriverbuiltinto thekernel),whilethenewinitramfsarchiveisagzippedcpio archive(liketaronlysimpler).Thekernel'scpioextractioncode isextremelysmall,it'salso__inittextanddatathatcanbe discardedduringthebootprocess. Theprogramrunbytheinitrddoessomesetupandthenreturnsto thekernel,whiletheinitprogramfrominitramfsisnotexpectedto returntothekernel.
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Initramfsfeaturesandadvantages(1)
Rootfilesystembuiltinthekernelimage (embeddedasacompressedcpioarchive). Veryeasytocreate(atkernelbuildtime). Noneedforrootpermissions(formountandmknod). Comparedtoinitramdisks, just1filetohandleinthebootloader. AlwayspresentintheLinux2.6kernel(emptybydefault). Justaplaincompressedcpioarchive. Neitherneedsablocknorafilesystemdriver.
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ramfs:implementedinthefilecache.NoduplicationinRAM,nofilesystem layertomanage.Justusesthesizeofitsfiles.Cangrowifneeded.
Access tofile VirtualFile System Filesystem driver Block(disk) driver Copy Blockstorage File cache
Regular blockdevice
Access tofile VirtualFile System Filesystem driver Block (ramdisk) driver
Ramdisk blockdevice
Access tofile VirtualFile System
ramfs
File cache Copy Blockstorage RAM
File cache
RAM
RAM
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Loadedbythekernelearlier. Moreinitializationcodemovedtouserspace! Simplertomountcomplexfilesystemsfromflexibleuserspace scriptsratherthanfromrigidkernelcode.Morecomplexity movedouttouserspace! Nomoremagicnamingoftherootdevice. pivot_rootnolongerneeded.
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PossibletoaddnonGPLfiles(firmware,proprietarydrivers) inthefilesystem.Thisisnotlinking,justfileaggregation (notconsideredasaderivedworkbytheGPL). Possibilitytoremovethesefileswhennolongerneeded. Moretechnicaldetailsaboutinitramfs: seeDocumentation/filesystems/ramfsrootfsinitramfs.txt andDocumentation/earlyuserspace/READMEinkernelsources. Seealsohttp://www.linuxdevices.com/articles/AT4017834659.htmlforanice overviewofinitramfs(byRobLandley,theexnewBusyboxmaintainer).
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Howtopopulateaninitramfs
UsingCONFIG_INITRAMFS_SOURCE inkernelconfiguration(GeneralSetupsection) Eithergiveanexistingcpioarchive. Orgivealistoffilesordirectories tobeaddedtothearchive. Orgiveatextspecificationfile(seenextpage). YoucanbuildyourinitramfswithatinyClibrary andthetinyexecutablesitships: klibc:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klibc
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Initramfsspecificationfileexample
dir/dev75500 nod/dev/console64400c51 permissions nod/dev/loop064400b70 dir/bin75510001000 file/bin/busybox/stuff/initramfs/busybox75500 slink/bin/shbusybox77700 dir/proc75500 dir/sys75500 dir/mnt75500 file/init/stuff/initramfs/init.sh75500 Noneedforrootuseraccess! userid groupid major minor
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Howtohandlecompressedcpioarchives
Usefulwhenyouwanttobuildthekernelwithareadymadecpio archive.Betterletthekerneldothisforyou!
Extracting: gzipdcinitramfs.img|cpioid Creating:

find<dir>printdepth|cpioov|gzipc> initramfs.img
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Howtocreateaninitrd
Incaseyouneedaninitrd: sudomkdir/mnt/initrd ddif=/dev/zeroof=initrd.imgbs=1kcount=2048 mkfs.ext2Finitrd.img sudomountoloopinitrd.img/mnt/initrd Filltheramdiskcontents:BusyBox,modules,/linuxrcscript MoredetailsintheFreeSoftwaretoolsforembeddedsystemstraining! sudoumount/mnt/initrd gzipbestcinitrd.img>initrd MoredetailsonDocumentation/initrd.txtinthekernel sources!Alsoexplainspivotrooting.
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Bootingvariants
XIP(ExecuteInPlace) Thekernelimageisdirectlyexecutedfromthestorage CanbefasterandsaveRAM However,thekernelimagecan'tbecompressed Noinitramfs/initrd Directlymountingthefinalrootfilesystem (rootkernelcommandlineoption) Nonewrootfilesystem Runningthewholesystemfromtheinitramfs.
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Bootloaders
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2stagebootloaders
Atstartup,thehardwareautomaticallyexecutesthebootloader viaXIPfromagivenlocation,usuallywithverylittlespace (suchasthebootsectoronaPCharddisk) Becauseofthislackofspace,2stagesareimplemented:
1st stage:minimumfunctionality.ConfigureRAMcontrollerand someCPUregisters.RelocatethecodeandjumpinRAM. 2nd stage:offersthefullbootloaderfunctionality.Nolimitinwhat canbeimplemented.Canevenbeanoperatingsystemitself!
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x86bootloaders(PCworld)
LILO:LInuxLOad.OriginalLinuxbootloader.Nowrare. http://freshmeat.net/projects/lilo/ Supports:x86 GRUB:GRandUnifiedBootloaderfromGNU.Morepowerful. http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/ Supports:x86 SeeourGrubdetailsannexfordetails. SYSLINUX:Utilitiesfornetworkandremovablemediabooting http://syslinux.zytor.com Supports:x86
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Bootloadersforembeddedworld
DasUBoot:UniversalBootloaderfromDenxSoftware Themostusedonarm. http://www.denx.de/wiki/UBoot/WebHome Supports:arm,powerpc,mips,x86,m68k,nios... SeeUbootdetailsannexfordetails. RedBoot:eCosbasedbootloaderfromRedHat http://sources.redhat.com/redboot/ Supports:x86,arm,powerpc,mips,sh,m68k... uMon:MicroMonitorgeneralpurpose,multiOSbootloader http://microcross.com/html/micromonitor.html Supports:ARM,ColdFire,SH2,m68k,MIPS,PowerPC,Xscale...
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Kernelbooting
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Kernelcommandlineparameters
LikemostCprograms,theLinuxkernelaccepts commandlinearguments Kernelcommandlineargumentsarepartofthebootloader configurationsettings. Usefultomodifythebehaviorofthekernel atboottime,withouthavingtorecompileit. Usefultoperformadvancedkernelanddriverinitialization, withouthavingtousecomplexuserspacescripts.
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Kernelcommandlineexample
HPiPAQh2200PDAbootingexample: root=/dev/ram0\ rw\ init=/linuxrc\ console=ttyS0,115200n8\ console=tty0\ ramdisk_size=8192\ cachepolicy=writethrough Rootfilesystem(firstramdisk) Rootfilesystemmountingmode Firstuserspaceprogram Console(serial) Otherconsole(framebuffer) Miscparameters...
Hundredsofcommandlineparametersdescribedon Documentation/kernelparameters.txt
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UsefulnessofrootfsonNFS
Oncenetworkingworks,yourrootfilesystemcouldbeadirectoryon yourGNU/Linuxdevelopmenthost,exportedbyNFS(NetworkFile System).Thisisveryconvenientforsystemdevelopment: Makesitveryeasytoupdatefiles(drivermodulesinparticular)on therootfilesystem,withoutrebooting.Muchfasterthanthroughthe serialport. Canhaveabigrootfilesystemevenifyoudon'thavesupportfor internalorexternalstorageyet. Therootfilesystemcanbehuge.Youcanevenbuildnativecompiler toolsandbuildallthetoolsyouneedonthetargetitself(betterto crosscompilethough).
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NFSbootsetup(1)
Onthehost(NFSserver) Addthebelowlinetoyour/etc/exportsfile:
/home/rootfs192.168.0.202(rw,no_root_squash,no_subtree_check)
StartorrestartyourNFSserver(Example:Debian,Ubuntu)
/etc/init.d/nfskernelserverrestart
clientaddress
NFSserveroptions
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NFSbootsetup(2)
Onthetarget(NFSclient) CompileyourkernelwithCONFIG_NFS_FS=y, CONFIG_IP_PNP=y(configureIPatboottime) andCONFIG_ROOT_NFS=y Bootthekernelwiththebelowcommandlineoptions:
root=/dev/nfs virtualdevice ip=192.168.1.111:192.168.1.110:192.168.1.100:255.255.255.0:at91:eth0 localIPaddress serverIPaddress gateway netmask hostnamedevice nfsroot=192.168.1.110:/home/nfsroot NFSserverIPaddressDirectoryontheNFSserver
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Firstuserspaceprogram
Specifiedbytheinitkernelcommandlineparameter Examples:init=/bin/shorinit=/sbin/init Executedattheendofbootingbythekernel. Takescareofstartingallotheruserspaceprograms (systemservicesanduserprograms). Getsthe1processnumber(pid) Parentorancestorofalluserspaceprograms Thesystemwon'tletyoukillit.
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/linuxrc
Programexecutedbydefaultwhenbootingfromaninit ramdiskandnoinitparameterisgiventothekernel. Ismostofthetimeashellscript,basedonaverylightweight shellsuchasnashandbusyboxsh Thisscriptcanimplementcomplextasks:detectingdriversto load,settingupnetworking,mountingpartitions,switching toanewrootfilesystem.
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Theinitprogram
/sbin/initistheseconddefaultinitprogram Takescareofstartingsystemservices,andeventuallytheuser interfaces(sshd,Xserver...). Alsotakescareofstoppingsystemservices. Lightweight,partialimplementationavailablethroughBusyBox. SeetheInitrunlevelsannexsectionformoredetailsaboutstarting andstoppingsystemserviceswithinit. However,simplestartupscriptsareoftensufficient inembeddedsystems.
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Driverdevelopment
Loadablekernelmodules
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Loadablekernelmodules(1)
Modules:addagivenfunctionalitytothekernel(drivers, filesystemsupport,andmanyothers). Canbeloadedandunloadedatanytime,onlywhentheir functionalityisneed.Onceloaded,havefullaccesstothe wholekerneladdressspace.Noparticularprotection. Usefultokeepthekernelimagesizetotheminimum (essentialinGNU/LinuxdistributionsforPCs).
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Loadablekernelmodules(2)
Usefultodeliverbinaryonlydrivers(badidea) withouthavingtorebuildthekernel. Modulesmakeiteasytodevelopdriverswithoutrebooting: load,test,unload,rebuild,load...
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Symbolsexportedtomodules
Fromakernelmodule,onlyalimitednumberofkernelfunctionscan becalled. Functionsandvariableshavetobeexplicitlyexported bythekerneltobevisiblefromakernelmodule. Twomacrosareusedinthekerneltoexportfunctionsandvariables: EXPORT_SYMBOL(symbolname),whichexportsafunctionor variabletoallmodules EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL(symbolname),whichexportsa functionorvariableonlytoGPLmodules Anormaldrivershouldnotneedanynonexportedfunction.
147
Moduledependencies
Moduledependenciesstoredin /lib/modules/<version>/modules.dep Theyareautomaticallycomputedduringkernelbuildingfrommodule exportedsymbols.module2dependsonmodule1ifmodule2 usesasymbolexportedbymodule1. Example:usb_storagedependsonusbcore, becauseitusessomeofthefunctionsexportedbyusbcore. Youcanalsoupdatethemodules.depfile byyourself,byrunning(asroot): depmoda[<version>]
148
hellomodule
/*hello.c*/ /*hello.c*/ #include<linux/init.h> #include<linux/init.h> #include<linux/module.h> #include<linux/module.h> #include<linux/kernel.h> #include<linux/kernel.h> staticint__inithello_init(void) {staticint__inithello_init(void) { printk(KERN_ALERT"Goodmorrow"); printk(KERN_ALERT"Goodmorrow"); printk(KERN_ALERT"tothisfairassembly.\n"); printk(KERN_ALERT"tothisfairassembly.\n"); return0; }return0; } staticvoid__exithello_exit(void) {staticvoid__exithello_exit(void) { printk(KERN_ALERT"Alas,poorworld,whattreasure"); printk(KERN_ALERT"Alas,poorworld,whattreasure"); printk(KERN_ALERT"hastthoulost!\n"); }printk(KERN_ALERT"hastthoulost!\n"); } module_init(hello_init); module_init(hello_init); module_exit(hello_exit); module_exit(hello_exit); MODULE_LICENSE("GPL"); MODULE_LICENSE("GPL"); MODULE_DESCRIPTION("Greetingmodule"); MODULE_DESCRIPTION("Greetingmodule"); MODULE_AUTHOR("WilliamShakespeare"); MODULE_AUTHOR("WilliamShakespeare");
__init: removedafterinitialization (statickernelormodule). __exit:discardedwhen modulecompiledstatically intothekernel.
Exampleavailableonhttp://freeelectrons.com/doc/c/hello.c
149
Modulelicenseusefulness
Usedbykerneldeveloperstoidentifyissuescomingfrom proprietarydrivers,whichtheycan'tdoanythingabout (Taintedkernelnoticeinkernelcrashesandoopses). Usefulforuserstocheckthattheirsystemis100%free (check/proc/sys/kernel/tainted). UsefulforGNU/Linuxdistributorsfortheirreleasepolicy checks.
150
Possiblemodulelicensestrings
Availablelicensestringsexplainedininclude/linux/module.h GPL GNUPublicLicensev2orlater GPLv2 GNUPublicLicensev2 GPLandadditional rights DualMIT/GPL GNUPublicLicensev2orMIT DualBSD/GPL GNUPublicLicensev2orBSD DualMPL/GPL GNUPublicLicensev2 orMozilla Proprietary Nonfreeproducts
151
Compilingamodule
ThebelowMakefileshouldbereusableforanyLinux2.6module. Justrunmaketobuildthehello.kofile Caution:makesurethereisa[Tab]characteratthebeginningof the$(MAKE)line(makesyntax).
#Makefileforthehellomodule #Makefileforthehellomodule objm:=hello.o objm:=hello.o KDIR:=/lib/modules/$(shellunamer)/build KDIR:=/lib/modules/$(shellunamer)/build PWD:=$(shellpwd) PWD:=$(shellpwd) all: all: $(MAKE)C$(KDIR)SUBDIRS=$(PWD)modules $(MAKE)C$(KDIR)SUBDIRS=$(PWD)modules Exampleavailableonhttp://freeelectrons.com/doc/c/Makefile
[Tab]! (nospaces)
Either fullkernelsource directory (configuredand compiled) orjustkernel headersdirectory (minimumneeded)
152
Kernellog
Ofcourse,thekerneldoesn'tstoreitslogintoafile! Filesbelongtouserspace. Thekernelkeepsprintkmessagesinacircularbuffer (sothatdoesn'tconsumemorememorywithmanymessages). Kernellogmessagescanbeaccessedfromuserspacethroughsystem calls,orthrough/proc/kmsg Kernellogmessagesarealsodisplayedinthesystemconsole.
153
Accessingthekernellog
Manywaysareavailable!
Watchthesystemconsole syslogd/klogd Daemongatheringkernelmessages in/var/log/messages Followchangesbyrunning: tailf/var/log/messages Caution:thisfilegrows! Uselogrotatetocontrolthis cat/proc/kmsg Waitsforkernelmessagesand displaysthem. Usefulwhennoneoftheabove userspaceprogramsareavailable (tinysystem) dmesg(diagnosticmessage) Foundinallsystems Displaysthekernellogbuffer
154
Usingthemodule
Loadthemodule: sudoinsmod./hello.ko Youwillseethefollowinginthekernellog: Goodmorrow tothisfairassembly Nowremovethemodule: sudormmodhello Youwillsee: Alas,poorworld,whattreasure hastthoulost!
155
Understandingmoduleloadingissues
Whenloadingamodulefails, insmodoftendoesn'tgiveyouenoughdetails! Detailsareavailableinthekernellog. Example:
>sudoinsmod./intr_monitor.ko insmod:errorinserting'./intr_monitor.ko':1 Deviceorresourcebusy >dmesg [17549774.552000]Failedtoregisterhandlerfor irqchannel2
156
Moduleutilities(1)
modinfo<module_name> modinfo<module_path>.ko Getsinformationaboutamodule:parameters,license, descriptionanddependencies. Veryusefulbeforedecidingtoloadamoduleornot. sudoinsmod<module_path>.ko Triestoloadthegivenmodule.
157
Moduleutilities(2)
sudomodprobe<module_name> Mostcommonusageofmodprobe:triestoloadallthe modulesthegivenmoduledependson,andthenthismodule. Lotsofotheroptionsareavailable. lsmod Displaysthelistofloadedmodules Compareitsoutputwiththecontentsof/proc/modules!
158
Moduleutilities(3)
sudormmod<module_name> Triestoremovethegivenmodule sudomodprober<module_name> Triestoremovethegivenmoduleandalldependentmodules (whicharenolongerneededafterthemoduleremoval)
159
Createyourmoduleswithkdevelop
http://kdevelop.orgAvailableinmostdistros. Makesiteasytocreate amodulecodeskeleton fromareadymade template. Canalsobeusedto compileyourmodule.
160
Driverdevelopment
Moduleparameters
161
hellomodulewithparameters
/*hello_param.c*/ /*hello_param.c*/ #include<linux/init.h> #include<linux/init.h> #include<linux/module.h> #include<linux/module.h> #include<linux/moduleparam.h> #include<linux/moduleparam.h> MODULE_LICENSE("GPL"); MODULE_LICENSE("GPL"); /*Acoupleofparametersthatcanbepassedin:howmanytimeswesay /*Acoupleofparametersthatcanbepassedin:howmanytimeswesay hello,andtowhom*/ hello,andtowhom*/ staticchar*whom="world"; staticchar*whom="world"; module_param(whom,charp,0); module_param(whom,charp,0); staticinthowmany=1; staticinthowmany=1; module_param(howmany,int,0); module_param(howmany,int,0); staticint__inithello_init(void) { staticint__inithello_init(void) { inti; inti; for(i=0;i<howmany;i++) for(i=0;i<howmany;i++) printk(KERN_ALERT"(%d)Hello,%s\n",i,whom); printk(KERN_ALERT"(%d)Hello,%s\n",i,whom); return0; } return0; } staticvoid__exithello_exit(void) { staticvoid__exithello_exit(void) { printk(KERN_ALERT"Goodbye,cruel%s\n",whom); } printk(KERN_ALERT"Goodbye,cruel%s\n",whom); } module_init(hello_init); module_init(hello_init); module_exit(hello_exit); module_exit(hello_exit);
Thanksto JonathanCorbet fortheexample!
Exampleavailableonhttp://freeelectrons.com/doc/c/hello_param.c
162
Passingmoduleparameters
Throughinsmod: sudoinsmod./hello_param.kohowmany=2whom=universe Throughmodprobe: Setparametersin/etc/modprobe.conforinanyfilein/etc/modprobe.d/: optionshello_paramhowmany=2whom=universe Throughthekernelcommandline, whenthemoduleisbuiltstaticallyintothekernel: optionshello_param.howmany=2hello_param.whom=universe
modulename moduleparametername moduleparametervalue

163
Declaringamoduleparameter
#include<linux/moduleparam.h> module_param( name, /*nameofanalreadydefinedvariable*/ type, /*eitherbyte,short,ushort,int,uint,long, ulong,charp,orbool. (checkedatcompiletime!)*/ perm /*for/sys/module/<module_name>/parameters/<param> 0:nosuchmoduleparametervaluefile*/ ); Example intirq=5; module_param(irq,int,S_IRUGO);
164
Declaringamoduleparameterarray
#include<linux/moduleparam.h> module_param_array( name, /*nameofanalreadydefinedarray*/ type, /*sameasinmodule_param*/ num, /*numberofelementsinthearray,orNULL(nocheck?)*/ perm /*sameasinmodule_param*/ ); Example staticintbase[MAX_DEVICES]={0x820,0x840}; module_param_array(base,int,NULL,0);
165
Driverdevelopment
Addingsourcestothekerneltree
166
Newdriverinkernelsources(1)
Toaddanewdrivertothekernelsources: Addyournewsourcefiletotheappropriatesourcedirectory. Example:drivers/usb/serial/navman.c Describetheconfigurationinterfaceforyournewdriver byaddingthefollowinglinestotheKconfigfileinthisdirectory:
configUSB_SERIAL_NAVMAN tristate"USBNavmanGPSdevice" dependsonUSB_SERIAL help Tocompilethisdriverasamodule,chooseMhere:the modulewillbecallednavman.
167
Newdriverinkernelsources(2)
AddalineintheMakefilefilebasedontheKconfigsetting:
obj$(CONFIG_USB_SERIAL_NAVMAN)+=navman.o
Runmakexconfigandseeyournewoptions! Runmakeandyournewfilesarecompiled!
SeeDocumentation/kbuild/fordetails
EmbeddedLinuxkernelanddriverdevelopment Copyright2009 2010 ,MarcoStornelli CreativeCommonsAttributionShareAlike3.0license Mar20 ,2010
111
HowtocreateLinuxpatches
Downloadthelatestkernelsources Makeacopyofthesesources: rsyncalinux2.6.9rc2/linux2.6.9rc2patch/ Applyyourchangestothecopiedsources,andtestthem. Runmakedistcleantokeeponlysourcefiles. Createapatchfile: diffNurplinux2.6.9rc2/\ linux2.6.9rc2patch/>patchfile Alwayscomparethewholesourcestructures (suitableforpatchp1) Patchfilename:shouldrecallwhatthepatchisabout.
ThankstoNicolasRougier(Copyright2003,http://webloria.loria.fr/~rougier/)fortheTuximage
169
Driverdevelopment
Memorymanagement
170
Physicalandvirtualmemory
Physicaladdressspace
0xFFFFFFFFF
0xFFFFFFFFF
Virtualaddressspaces
0xFFFFFFFFF 0xC0000000
Kernel
I/Omemory3 I/Omemory2 I/Omemory1

Memory Management Unit
Process1
0x00000000
0x00000000
Flash
MMU
CPU
0xFFFFFFFFF
RAM1 RAM0 Alltheprocesseshavetheir ownvirtualaddressspace,and runasiftheyhadaccesstothe wholeaddressspace.
Kernel
0xC0000000
Process2
0x00000000
0x00000000
171
kmallocandkfree
Basicallocators,kernelequivalentsofglibc'smallocandfree.
#include<linux/slab.h> staticinlinevoid*kmalloc(size_tsize,intflags);
size:numberofbytestoallocate flags:priority(seenextpage)
voidkfree(constvoid*objp); Example:(drivers/infiniband/core/cache.c) structib_update_work*work; work=kmalloc(sizeof*work,GFP_ATOMIC); ... kfree(work);
172
kmallocfeatures
Quick(unlessit'sblockedwaitingformemorytobefreed). Doesn'tinitializetheallocatedarea. TheallocatedareaiscontiguousinphysicalRAM. Allocatesby2nsizes,andusesafewmanagementbytes. So,don'taskfor1024whenyouneed1000!You'dget2048! Caution:driversshouldn'ttrytokmalloc morethan128KB(upperlimitinsomearchitectures). Minimumallocation:32or64bytes(pagesizedependent).
173
Mainkmallocflags(1)
Definedininclude/linux/gfp.h(GFP:__get_free_pages) GFP_KERNEL Standardkernelmemoryallocation.Mayblock.Fineformostneeds. GFP_ATOMIC RAMallocatedfromcodewhichisnotallowedtoblock(interrupt handlers)orwhichdoesn'twanttoblock(criticalsections).Neverblocks. GFP_USER Allocatesmemoryforuserprocesses.Mayblock.Lowestpriority.
174
Mainkmallocflags(2)
Extraflags(canbeaddedwith|) __GFP_DMAorGFP_DMA AllocateinDMAzone __GFP_ZERO Returnsazeroedpage. __GFP_NOFAIL Mustnotfail.Nevergivesup. Caution:useonlywhen mandatory! __GFP_NORETRY Ifallocationfails,doesn'ttryto getfreepages. Example: GFP_KERNEL|__GFP_DMA Note:almostonly__GFP_DMA orGFP_DMAusedindevice drivers.
175
Relatedallocationfunctions
Again,namessimilartothoseofClibraryfunctions staticinlinevoid*kzalloc( size_tsize,gfp_tflags); Zeroestheallocatedbuffer. staticinlinevoid*kcalloc( size_tn,size_tsize,gfp_tflags); Allocatesmemoryforanarrayofnelementsofsizesize, andzeroesitscontents. void*__must_checkkrealloc( constvoid*,size_t,gfp_t); Changesthesizeofthegivenbuffer.
176
Availableallocators
Memoryisallocatedusingslabs(groupsofoneormorecontinuouspagesfrom whichobjectsareallocated).Severalcompatibleslaballocatorsareavailable: SLAB:original,wellprovenallocatorinLinux2.6. SLOB:muchsimpler.Morespaceefficientbutdoesn'tscalewell.Savesafew hundredsofKBinsmallsystems(dependsonCONFIG_EMBEDDED) SLUB:thenewdefaultallocatorsince2.6.23,simplerthanSLAB,scaling muchbetter(inparticularforhugesystems)andcreatinglessfragmentation.
177
Slabcachesandmemorypools
Slabcaches:makeitpossibletoallocatemultiple objectsofthesamesize,withoutwastingRAM. Sofar,mainlyusedincoresubsystems, butnotmuchindevicedrivers (exceptUSBandSCSIdrivers) Memorypools:poolsofpreallocatedobjects, toincreasethechancesofallocationstosucceed. Oftenusedwithfilecaches. SeeourSlabcachesandmemorypoolsannexfordetails.
178
Allocatingbypages
MoreappropriatewhenyouneedbigslicesofRAM: Apageisusually4K,butcanbemadegreaterinsomearchitectures (sh,mips:4,8,16or64K,butnotconfigurableini386orarm). unsignedlongget_zeroed_page(intflags); Returnsapointertoafreepageandfillsitupwithzeros unsignedlong__get_free_page(intflags); Same,butdoesn'tinitializethecontents unsignedlong__get_free_pages(intflags, unsignedintorder); ReturnsapointeronanareaofseveralcontiguouspagesinphysicalRAM. order:log2(<number_of_pages>) Ifvariable,canbecomputedfromthesizewiththeget_orderfunction. Maximum:8192KB(MAX_ORDER=11ininclude/linux/mmzone.h), exceptinafewarchitectureswhenoverwrittenwithCONFIG_FORCE_MAX_ZONEORDER.
179
Freeingpages
voidfree_page(unsignedlongaddr); voidfree_pages(unsignedlongaddr, unsignedintorder); Needtousethesameorderasinallocation.
180
vmalloc
vmalloccanbeusedtoobtaincontiguousmemoryzones invirtualaddressspace(evenifpagesmaynotbe contiguousinphysicalmemory). void*vmalloc(unsignedlongsize); voidvfree(void*addr);
181
Memoryutilities
void*memset(void*s,intc,size_tcount); Fillsaregionofmemorywiththegivenvalue. void*memcpy(void*dest, constvoid*src, size_tcount); Copiesoneareaofmemorytoanother. Usememmovewithoverlappingareas. LotsoffunctionsequivalenttostandardClibraryonesdefinedin include/linux/string.h
182
MemorymanagementSummary
Smallallocations kmalloc,kzalloc (andkfree!) Slabcachesandmemorypools Biggerallocations __get_free_page[s], get_zeroed_page, free_page[s] vmalloc,vfree Libclikememoryutilities memset,memcopy, memmove...
183
Driverdevelopment
I/Omemoryandports
184
RequestingI/Oports
/proc/ioportsexample(x86) 0000001f:dma1 00200021:pic1 00400043:timer0 00500053:timer1 0060006f:keyboard 00700077:rtc 0080008f:dmapagereg 00a000a1:pic2 00c000df:dma2 00f000ff:fpu 0100013f:pcmcia_socket0 01700177:ide1 01f001f7:ide0 03760376:ide1 0378037a:parport0 03c003df:vga+ 03f603f6:ide0 03f803ff:serial 0800087f:0000:00:1f.0 08000803:PM1a_EVT_BLK 08040805:PM1a_CNT_BLK 0808080b:PM_TMR 08200820:PM2_CNT_BLK 0828082f:GPE0_BLK ...
structresource*request_region( unsignedlongstart, unsignedlonglen, char*name); TriestoreservethegivenregionandreturnsNULLif unsuccessful.Example: request_region(0x0170,8,"ide1"); voidrelease_region( unsignedlongstart, unsignedlonglen); Seeinclude/linux/ioport.hand kernel/resource.c
185
Reading/writingonI/Oports
Theimplementationofthebelowfunctions andtheexactunsignedtypecanvaryfromplatformtoplatform! bytes unsignedinb(unsignedport); voidoutb(unsignedcharbyte,unsignedport); words unsignedinw(unsignedport); voidoutw(unsignedcharbyte,unsignedport); "long"integers unsignedinl(unsignedport); voidoutl(unsignedcharbyte,unsignedport);
186
Reading/writingstringsonI/Oports
OftenmoreefficientthanthecorrespondingCloop, iftheprocessorsupportssuchoperations! bytestrings
voidinsb(unsignedport,void*addr,unsignedlongcount); voidoutsb(unsignedport,void*addr,unsignedlongcount);
wordstrings
voidinsw(unsignedport,void*addr,unsignedlongcount); voidoutsw(unsignedport,void*addr,unsignedlongcount);
longstrings
voidinsl(unsignedport,void*addr,unsignedlongcount); voidoutsl(unsignedport,void*addr,unsignedlongcount);
187
RequestingI/Omemory
/proc/iomemexample 000000000009efff:SystemRAM 0009f0000009ffff:reserved 000a0000000bffff:VideoRAMarea 000c0000000cffff:VideoROM 000f0000000fffff:SystemROM 001000003ffadfff:SystemRAM 001000000030afff:Kernelcode 0030b000003b4bff:Kerneldata 3ffae0003fffffff:reserved 40000000400003ff:0000:00:1f.1 4000100040001fff:0000:02:01.0 4000100040001fff:yenta_socket 4000200040002fff:0000:02:01.1 4000200040002fff:yenta_socket 40400000407fffff:PCICardBus#03 4080000040bfffff:PCICardBus#03 40c0000040ffffff:PCICardBus#07 41000000413fffff:PCICardBus#07 a0000000a0000fff:pcmcia_socket0 a0001000a0001fff:pcmcia_socket1 e0000000e7ffffff:0000:00:00.0 e8000000efffffff:PCIBus#01 e8000000efffffff:0000:01:00.0 ...
Equivalentfunctionswiththesameinterface
structresource*request_mem_region( unsignedlongstart, unsignedlonglen, char*name); voidrelease_mem_region( unsignedlongstart, unsignedlonglen);
188
ChoosingI/Oranges
I/Oportandmemoryrangescanbepassedasmodule parameters.Aneasywaytodefinethoseparametersis through/etc/modprobe.conf. Modulescanalsotrytofindfreerangesbythemselves (makingmultiplecallstorequest_regionor request_mem_region.
189
MappingI/Omemoryinvirtualmemory
ToaccessI/Omemory,driversneedtohaveavirtualaddress thattheprocessorcanhandle. Theioremapfunctionssatisfythisneed: #include<asm/io.h>; void*ioremap(unsignedlongphys_addr, unsignedlongsize); voidiounmap(void*address); Caution:checkthatioremapdoesn'treturnaNULLaddress!
190
Differenceswithstandardmemory
Readsandwritesonmemorycanbecached. Thecompilermaychoosetowritethevalueinacpuregister, andmayneverwriteitinmainmemory. Thecompilermaydecidetooptimizeorreorderreadand writeinstructions.
191
AvoidingI/Oaccessissues
CachingonI/Oportsormemoryalreadydisabled,eitherbythe hardwareorbyLinuxinitcode. UsethevolatilestatementinyourCcodetopreventthecompiler fromusingregistersinsteadofwritingtomemory. Memorybarriersaresuppliedtoavoidreordering. Hardwareindependent #include<asm/kernel.h> voidbarrier(void); Onlyimpactsthebehaviorofthe compiler.Doesn'tpreventreordering intheprocessor! Hardwaredependent #include<asm/system.h> voidrmb(void); voidwmb(void); voidmb(void); Safeonallarchitectures!
192
AccessingI/Omemory
Directlyreadingfromorwritingtoaddressesreturnedbyioremap (pointerdereferencing)maynotworkonsomearchitectures. Usethebelowfunctionsinstead.Theyarealwaysportableandsafe:
unsignedintioread8(void*addr);(samefor16and32) voidiowrite8(u8value,void*addr);(samefor16and32)
Toreadorwriteaseriesofvalues:
voidioread8_rep(void*addr,void*buf,unsignedlongcount); voidiowrite8_rep(void*addr,constvoid*buf,unsignedlongcount);
Otherusefulfunctions:
voidmemset_io(void*addr,u8value,unsignedintcount); voidmemcpy_fromio(void*dest,void*source,unsignedintcount); voidmemcpy_toio(void*dest,void*source,unsignedintcount);
193
/dev/mem
Usedtoprovideuserspaceapplicationswithdirectaccessto physicaladdresses. Usage:open/dev/memandreadorwriteatgivenoffset. Whatyoureadorwriteisthevalueatthecorresponding physicaladdress. UsedbyapplicationssuchastheXserver towritedirectlytodevicememory. Since2.6.26(x86onlysofar):onlynonRAMcanbe accessed,unlessexplicitlyconfiguredotherwise(forsecurity reasons).
194
Driverdevelopment
Characterdrivers
195
Creatingacharacterdriver
Userspaceneeds Thenameofadevicefilein/devtointeract withthedevicedriverthroughregularfile operations(open,read,write,close...) Thekernelneeds
Copyfromuser Copytouser
Userspace
Read buffer read /dev/foo major/minor Write string write
Toknowwhichdriverisinchargeofdevice fileswithagivenmajor/minornumberpair
Foragivendriver,tohavehandlers(file operations)toexecutewhenuserspaceopens, reads,writesorclosesthedevicefile.
Read handler
Write handler
Devicedriver Kernelspace
196
Declaringacharacterdriver
Devicenumberregistration Needtoregisteroneormoredevicenumbers(major/minorpairs), dependingonthenumberofdevicesmanagedbythedriver. Needtofindfreeones! Fileoperationsregistration Needtoregisterhandlerfunctionscalledwhenuserspaceprograms accessthedevicefiles:open,read,write,ioctl,close...
197
Informationonregistereddevices
Registereddevicesarevisiblein/proc/devices:
Characterdevices: Characterdevices: 1mem 1mem 4/dev/vc/0 4/dev/vc/0 4tty 4tty 4ttyS 4ttyS 5/dev/tty 5/dev/tty 5/dev/console 5/dev/console 5/dev/ptmx 5/dev/ptmx 6lp 6lp 10misc 10misc 13input 13input 14sound 14sound ... ... Blockdevices: Blockdevices: 1ramdisk 1ramdisk 3ide0 3ide0 8sd 8sd 9md 9md 22ide1 22ide1 65sd 65sd 66sd 66sd 67sd 67sd 68sd 68sd
Canbeusedto findfreemajor numbers
Major number
Registered name
198
dev_tdatatype
Kerneldatatypetorepresentamajor/minornumberpair Alsocalledadevicenumber. Definedin<linux/kdev_t.h> Linux2.6:32bitsize(major:12bits,minor:20bits) Macrotocreatethedevicenumber: MKDEV(intmajor,intminor); Macrotoextracttheminorandmajornumbers: MAJOR(dev_tdev); MINOR(dev_tdev);
199
Allocatingfixeddevicenumbers
#include<linux/fs.h> intregister_chrdev_region( dev_tfrom, /*Startingdevicenumber*/ unsignedcount, /*Numberofdevicenumbers*/ constchar*name); /*Registeredname*/ Returns0iftheallocationwassuccessful. Example
if(register_chrdev_region(MKDEV(202,128), acme_count,acme)){ printk(KERN_ERRFailedtoallocatedevicenumber\n); ...
200
Dynamicallocationofdevicenumbers
Safer:havethekernelallocatefreenumbersforyou! #include<linux/fs.h> intalloc_chrdev_region( dev_t*dev, /*Output:startingdevicenumber*/ unsignedbaseminor, /*Startingminornumber,usually0*/ unsignedcount, /*Numberofdevicenumbers*/ constchar*name); /*Registeredname*/ Returns0iftheallocationwassuccessful. Example
if(alloc_chrdev_region(&acme_dev,0,acme_count,acme)){ printk(KERN_ERRFailedtoallocatedevicenumber\n); ...
201
Creatingdevicefiles
Issue:youcannolongercreate/deventriesinadvance! Youhavetocreatethemontheflyafterloadingthedriveraccordingto theallocatedmajornumber. Trick:thescriptloadingthemodulecanthenuse/proc/devices and/proc/misc:
module=foo;name=foo;device=foo rmf/dev/$device insmod$module.ko major=`awk"\\$2==\"$name\"{print\\$1}"/proc/devices` minor=`awk"\\$2==\"$name\"{print\\$1}"/proc/misc` mknod/dev/$devicec$major$minor
Better:useudevtocreatethedevicefileautomatically. Seeudev,mdevandhotplugsection.
202
Fileoperations(1)
Beforeregisteringcharacterdevices,youhavetodefine file_operations(calledfops)forthedevicefiles. Herearethemainones: int(*open)( structinode*,/*Correspondstothedevicefile*/ structfile*);/*Correspondstotheopenfiledescriptor*/ Calledwhenuserspaceopensthedevicefile. int(*release)( structinode*, structfile*); Calledwhenuserspaceclosesthefile.
203
Thefilestructure
Iscreatedbythekernelduringtheopencall.Representsopenfiles. mode_tf_mode; Thefileopeningmode(FMODE_READand/orFMODE_WRITE) loff_tf_pos; Currentoffsetinthefile. structfile_operations*f_op; Allowstochangefileoperationsfordifferentopenfiles! structdentry*f_dentry Usefultogetaccesstotheinode:f_dentry>d_inode.
204
Fileoperations(2)
ssize_t(*read)( structfile*, /*Openfiledescriptor*/ __userchar*, /*Userspacebuffertofillup*/ size_t, /*Sizeoftheuserspacebuffer*/ loff_t*); /*Offsetintheopenfile*/ Calledwhenuserspacereadsfromthedevicefile. ssize_t(*write)( structfile*, __userconstchar*, /*Openfiledescriptor*/ /*Userspacebuffertowrite tothedevice*/ size_t, /*Sizeoftheuserspacebuffer*/ loff_t*); /*Offsetintheopenfile*/ Calledwhenuserspacewritestothedevicefile.
205
Exchangingdatawithuserspace(1)
Indrivercode,youcan'tjustmemcpybetween anaddresssuppliedbyuserspaceand theaddressofabufferinkernelspace! Correspondtocompletelydifferent addressspaces(thankstovirtualmemory) Theuserspaceaddressmaybeswappedouttodisk Theuserspaceaddressmaybeinvalid (userspaceprocesstryingtoaccessunauthorizeddata)
206
Exchangingdatawithuserspace(2)
Youmustusededicatedfunctionssuchasthefollowingones inyourreadandwritefileoperationscode: include<asm/uaccess.h> unsignedlongcopy_to_user(void__user*to, constvoid*from, unsignedlongn); unsignedlongcopy_from_user(void*to, constvoid__user*from, unsignedlongn); Makesurethatthesefunctionsreturn0! Anotherreturnvaluewouldmeanthattheyfailed.
207
Fileoperations(3)
int(*ioctl)(structinode*,structfile*, unsignedint,unsignedlong); Canbeusedtosendspecificcommandstothedevice,whichareneither readingnorwriting(e.g.changingthespeedofaserialport,setting videooutputformat,queryingadeviceserialnumber...).
208
Fileoperationsspecifictoeachopenfile!
Usingthepossibilitytoredefinefileoperationsforeachopenfile.
getPAL video getNTSC video!
Process1 read Openfile1 open
Process2 ioctl:change readfop Openfile2 read
open /dev/video
2differentprocesses canreaddifferentdata fromthesamedevicefile!
209
Fileoperations(4)
int(*mmap)(structfile*, structvm_area_struct*); Askingfordevicememorytobemapped intotheaddressspaceofauserprocess. Moreinourmmapsection. Thesewerejustthemainones: about25fileoperationscanbeset,correspondingtoall thesystemcallsthatcanbeperformedonopenfiles.
210
readoperationexample
staticssize_t staticssize_t acme_read(structfile*file,char__user*buf,size_tcount,loff_t*ppos) {acme_read(structfile*file,char__user*buf,size_tcount,loff_t*ppos) { /*Theacme_bufaddresscorrespondstoadeviceI/Omemoryarea*/ /*Theacme_bufaddresscorrespondstoadeviceI/Omemoryarea*/ /*ofsizeacme_bufsize,obtainedwithioremap()*/ /*ofsizeacme_bufsize,obtainedwithioremap()*/ intremaining_size,transfer_size; intremaining_size,transfer_size; remaining_size=acme_bufsize(int)(*ppos);//byteslefttotransfer remaining_size=acme_bufsize(int)(*ppos);//byteslefttotransfer if(remaining_size==0){/*Allread,returning0(EndOfFile)*/ if(remaining_size==0){/*Allread,returning0(EndOfFile)*/ return0; } return0; } /*Sizeofthistransfer*/ /*Sizeofthistransfer*/ transfer_size=min(remaining_size,(int)count); transfer_size=min(remaining_size,(int)count); if(copy_to_user(buf/*to*/,acme_buf+*ppos/*from*/,transfer_size)){ if(copy_to_user(buf/*to*/,acme_buf+*ppos/*from*/,transfer_size)){ returnEFAULT; returnEFAULT; }else{/*Increasethepositionintheopenfile*/ }else{/*Increasethepositionintheopenfile*/ *ppos+=transfer_size; *ppos+=transfer_size; returntransfer_size; returntransfer_size; } }} }
Readmethod
Pieceofcodeavailablein http://freeelectrons.com/doc/c/acme.c
211
writeoperationexample
staticssize_t staticssize_t acme_write(structfile*file,constchar__user*buf,size_tcount,loff_t*ppos) {acme_write(structfile*file,constchar__user*buf,size_tcount,loff_t*ppos) { intremaining_bytes; intremaining_bytes; /*Numberofbytesnotwrittenyetinthedevice*/ /*Numberofbytesnotwrittenyetinthedevice*/ remaining_bytes=acme_bufsize(*ppos); remaining_bytes=acme_bufsize(*ppos); if(count>remaining_bytes){ if(count>remaining_bytes){ /*Can'twritebeyondtheendofthedevice*/ /*Can'twritebeyondtheendofthedevice*/ returnEIO; } returnEIO; } if(copy_from_user(acme_buf+*ppos/*to*/,buf/*from*/,count)){ if(copy_from_user(acme_buf+*ppos/*to*/,buf/*from*/,count)){ returnEFAULT; returnEFAULT; }else{ }else{ /*Increasethepositionintheopenfile*/ /*Increasethepositionintheopenfile*/ *ppos+=count; *ppos+=count; returncount; returncount; } }} }
Writemethod
Pieceofcodeavailablein http://freeelectrons.com/doc/c/acme.c
212
fileoperationsdefinitionexample(3)
Definingafile_operationsstructure:
#include<linux/fs.h> staticstructfile_operationsacme_fops= { .owner=THIS_MODULE, .read=acme_read, .write=acme_write, };
Youjustneedtosupplythefunctionsyouimplemented! Defaultsforotherfunctions(suchasopen,release...) arefineifyoudonotimplementanythingspecial.

213
Characterdeviceregistration(1)
Thekernelrepresentscharacterdriverswithacdevstructure Declarethisstructureglobally(withinyourmodule): #include<linux/cdev.h> staticstructcdevacme_cdev; Intheinitfunction,initializethestructure: cdev_init(&acme_cdev,&acme_fops);
214
Characterdeviceregistration(2)
Then,nowthatyourstructureisready,addittothesystem: intcdev_add( structcdev*p, /*Characterdevicestructure*/ dev_tdev, /*Startingdevicemajor/minornumber*/ unsignedcount); /*Numberofdevices*/
Example(continued):
if(cdev_add(&acme_cdev,acme_dev,acme_count)){ printk(KERN_ERRChardriverregistrationfailed\n);
...
215
Characterdeviceunregistration
Firstdeleteyourcharacterdevice: voidcdev_del(structcdev*p); Then,andonlythen,freethedevicenumber: voidunregister_chrdev_region(dev_tfrom, unsignedcount); Example(continued): cdev_del(&acme_cdev); unregister_chrdev_region(acme_dev,acme_count);
216
Linuxerrorcodes
Trytoreporterrorswitherrornumbersasaccurateaspossible! Fortunately,macronamesareexplicitandyoucanremember themquickly. Genericerrorcodes: include/asmgeneric/errnobase.h Platformspecificerrorcodes: include/asm/errno.h
217
Chardriverexamplesummary(1)
staticvoid*acme_buf; staticvoid*acme_buf; staticintacme_bufsize=8192; staticintacme_bufsize=8192; staticintacme_count=1; staticintacme_count=1; staticdev_tacme_dev; staticdev_tacme_dev; staticstructcdevacme_cdev; staticstructcdevacme_cdev; staticssize_tacme_write(...){...} staticssize_tacme_write(...){...} staticssize_tacme_read(...){...} staticssize_tacme_read(...){...} staticstructfile_operationsacme_fops= staticstructfile_operationsacme_fops= { { .owner=THIS_MODULE, .owner=THIS_MODULE, .read=acme_read, .read=acme_read, .write=acme_write .write=acme_write }; };
218
Chardriverexamplesummary(2)
Showshowtohandleerrorsanddeallocateresourcesintherightorder!
staticint__initacme_init(void) {staticint__initacme_init(void) { interr; interr; acme_buf=ioremap(ACME_PHYS, acme_buf=ioremap(ACME_PHYS, acme_bufsize); acme_bufsize); if(!acme_buf){ if(!acme_buf){ err=ENOMEM; err=ENOMEM; gotoerr_exit; gotoerr_exit; } } if(alloc_chrdev_region(&acme_dev,0, if(alloc_chrdev_region(&acme_dev,0, acme_count,acme)){ acme_count,acme)){ err=ENODEV; err=ENODEV; gotoerr_free_buf; gotoerr_free_buf; } } cdev_init(&acme_cdev,&acme_fops); cdev_init(&acme_cdev,&acme_fops); if(cdev_add(&acme_cdev,acme_dev, if(cdev_add(&acme_cdev,acme_dev, acme_count)){ acme_count)){ err=ENODEV; err=ENODEV; gotoerr_dev_unregister; gotoerr_dev_unregister; } }
return0; return0; err_dev_unregister: err_dev_unregister: unregister_chrdev_region( unregister_chrdev_region( acme_dev,acme_count); acme_dev,acme_count); err_free_buf: err_free_buf: iounmap(acme_buf); iounmap(acme_buf); err_exit: err_exit: returnerr; }returnerr; } staticvoid__exitacme_exit(void) {staticvoid__exitacme_exit(void) { cdev_del(&acme_cdev); cdev_del(&acme_cdev); unregister_chrdev_region(acme_dev, unregister_chrdev_region(acme_dev, acme_count); acme_count); iounmap(acme_buf); }iounmap(acme_buf); }
Completeexamplecodeavailableonhttp://freeelectrons.com/doc/c/acme.c
219
Characterdriversummary
Definethefileoperationscallbacksforthedevicefile:read,write,ioctl... Inthemoduleinitfunction,getmajorandminornumberswithalloc_chrdev_region(), initacdevstructurewithyourfileoperationsandaddittothesystemwithcdev_add(). Inthemoduleexitfunction,callcdev_del()andunregister_chrdev_region()
Loadthecharacterdrivermodule In/proc/devices,findthemajornumberituses. Createthedevicefilewiththismajornumber Thedevicefileisreadytouse!
Kernel
Executesthecorrespondingfileoperations
EmbeddedLinuxkernelanddriverdevelopment Copyright2009 2010 ,MarcoStornelli CreativeCommonsAttributionShareAlike3.0license Mar20 ,2010
Kernel
Systemuser
Openthedevicefile,read,write,orsendioctl'stoit.
Userspace
Systemadministration
Kernel
Characterdriverwriter
111
Driverdevelopment
Debugging
221
Usefulnessofaserialport
ForpeopleportingLinuxonconsumerdevices(nodevelopmentboard) Mostprocessorsfeatureaserialportinterface(usuallyverywell supportedbyLinux).Justneedthisinterfacetobeconnectedtothe outside. Easywayofgettingthefirstmessagesofanearlykernelversion,even beforeitboots.Aminimumkernelwithonlyserialportsupportis enough. Oncethekernelisfixedandhascompletedbooting,possibletoaccessa serialconsoleandissuecommands. Theserialportcanalsobeusedtotransferfilestothetarget.
222
Whenyoudon'thaveaserialport
Onthehost Notanissue.YoucangetaUSBtoserialconverter.Usuallyvery wellsupportedonLinux.Thedeviceappearsas/dev/ttyUSB0 onthehost. Onthetarget CheckwhetheryouhaveanIrDAport.It'susuallyaserialporttoo. Youmayalsotrytomanuallyhookuptheprocessorserial interface(checktheelectricalspecificationsfirst!)
223
Debuggingwithprintk
Universaldebuggingtechniqueusedsincethebeginningof programming(firstfoundincavemendrawings). Printedornotintheconsoleor/var/log/messages accordingtothepriority.Thisiscontrolledbytheloglevel kernelparameter,orthrough/proc/sys/kernel/printk (seeDocumentation/sysctl/kernel.txt) Availablepriorities(include/linux/kernel.h):
#defineKERN_EMERG"<0>"/*systemisunusable*/ #defineKERN_ALERT"<1>"/*actionmustbetakenimmediately*/ #defineKERN_CRIT"<2>"/*criticalconditions*/ #defineKERN_ERR"<3>"/*errorconditions*/ #defineKERN_WARNING"<4>"/*warningconditions*/ #defineKERN_NOTICE"<5>"/*normalbutsignificantcondition*/ #defineKERN_INFO"<6>"/*informational*/ #defineKERN_DEBUG"<7>"/*debuglevelmessages*/
224
Debuggingwith/procor/sys(1)
Insteadofdumpingmessagesinthekernellog,youcanhaveyour driversmakeinformationavailabletouserspace. Throughafilein/procor/sys,whichcontentsarehandledby callbacksdefinedandregisteredbyyourdriver. Canbeusedtoshowanypieceofinformationaboutyourdevice ordriver. Canalsobeusedtosenddatatothedriverortocontrolit. Caution:anybodycanusethesefiles. Youshouldremoveyourdebugginginterfaceinproduction!
225
Debuggingwith/procor/sys(2)
Examples cat/proc/acme/stats(dummyexample) Displaysstatisticsaboutyouracmedriver. cat/proc/acme/globals(dummyexample) Displaysvaluesofglobalvariablesusedbyyourdriver.
echo600000>/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_setspeed
AdjuststhespeedoftheCPU(controlledbythecpufreqdriver).
226
Debugfs
Avirtualfilesystemtoexportdebugginginformationtouserspace. Kernelconfiguration:DEBUG_FS Kernelhacking>DebugFilesystem Muchsimplertocodethananinterfacein/procor/sys. ThedebugginginterfacedisappearswhenDebugfsisconfiguredout. Youcanmountitasfollows: sudomounttdebugfsnone/mnt/debugfs Describedonhttp://lwn.net/Articles/334068/ APIdocumentedintheLinuxKernelFilesystemAPI: http://freeelectrons.com/kerneldoc/latest/DocBook/filesystems/index.html
227
Simpledebugfsexample
#include<linux/debugfs.h> #include<linux/debugfs.h> staticchar*acme_buf; staticchar*acme_buf; staticunsignedlongacme_bufsize; staticunsignedlongacme_bufsize; staticstructdebugfs_blog_wrapperacme_blob; staticstructdebugfs_blog_wrapperacme_blob; staticstructdentry*acme_buf_dentry; staticstructdentry*acme_buf_dentry; staticu32acme_state; staticu32acme_state; staticstructdentry*acme_state_dentry; staticstructdentry*acme_state_dentry; //modulebuffer //modulebuffer
//modulevariable //modulevariable
/*Moduleinit*/ /*Moduleinit*/ acme_blob.data=acme_buf; acme_blob.data=acme_buf; acme_blob.size=acme_bufsize; acme_blob.size=acme_bufsize; acme_buf_dentry=debugfs_create_blog("acme_buf",S_IRUGO, acme_buf_dentry=debugfs_create_blog("acme_buf",S_IRUGO, NULL,&acme_blob); NULL,&acme_blob); acme_state_dentry=debugfs_create_u32("acme_state",S_IRUGO, acme_state_dentry=debugfs_create_u32("acme_state",S_IRUGO, NULL,&acme_state); NULL,&acme_state); /*Moduleexit*/ /*Moduleexit*/ debufs_remove(acme_buf_dentry); debufs_remove(acme_buf_dentry); debugfs_remove(acme_state_dentry); debugfs_remove(acme_state_dentry);
//Create //Create //newfiles //newfiles //indebugfs //indebugfs
//removingthefilesfromdebugfs //removingthefilesfromdebugfs
228
Debuggingwithioctl
Canusetheioctl()systemcalltoqueryinformation aboutyourdriver(ordevice)orsendcommandstoit. Thiscallstheioctlfileoperationthatyoucanregisterin yourdriver. Advantage:yourdebugginginterfaceisnotpublic. Youcouldevenleaveitwhenyoursystem(oritsdriver)isin thehandsofitsusers.
229
Debuggingwithgdb
Ifyouexecutethekernelfromadebuggeronthesamemachine, thiswillinterferewiththekernelbehavior. However,youcanaccessthecurrentkernelstatewithgdb: gdb/usr/src/linux/vmlinux/proc/kcore uncompressedkernelkerneladdressspace Youcanaccesskernelstructures,followpointers...(readonly!) RequiresthekerneltobecompiledwithCONFIG_DEBUG_INFO (Kernelhackingsection)
230
Kgdb
Kgdbisinmainlinesince2.6.26 Theexecutionofthekernelisfullycontrolledbygdbfrom anothermachine,connectedthroughaseriallineorethernet. Candoalmosteverything,includinginsertingbreakpointsin interrupthandlers. Supportedarchitecturessparc,sparc64,x86,powerpc, armandmips.
231
UsingKgdb(1)
Detailsavailableinthekerneldocumentation: http://freeelectrons.com/kerneldoc/latest/DocBook/kgdb/ RecommendedtoturnonCONFIG_FRAME_POINTERto aidinproducingmorereliablestackbacktracesingdb. YoumustincludeakgdbI/Odriver.Oneofthemiskgdb overserialconsole(kgdboc:kgdboverconsole,enabledby CONFIG_KGDB_SERIAL_CONSOLE) Configurekgdbocatboottimebypassingtothekernel: kgdboc=<ttydevice>,[baud].Forexample: kgdboc=ttyS0,115200
232
UsingKgdb(2)
Thenalsopasskgdbwaittothekernel: itmakeskgdbwaitforadebuggerconnection. Nowbootyourkernelanditwillwait.... Onyourworkstation,startgdbasfollows: %gdb./vmlinux (gdb)setremotebaud115200 (gdb)targetremote/dev/ttyS0 Onceconnected,youcandebugakernelthewayyouwould debuganapplicationprogram.
233
Kernelcrashanalysiswithkexec
kexecsystemcall:makesitpossibleto callanewkernel,withoutrebootingand goingthroughtheBIOS/firmware. Idea:afterakernelpanic,makethe kernelautomaticallyexecuteanew, cleankernelfromareservedlocationin RAM,toperformpostmortemanalysis ofthememoryofthecrashedkernel. Kdump,however,canbeveryram expensive! SeeDocumentation/kdump/kdump.txt inthekernelsourcesfordetails.
1.Copydebug kernelto reserved RAM 3.Analyze crashed kernelRAM
Standardkernel 2.kernel panic,kexec debugkernel Debugkernel
RegularRAM
234
DebuggingwithSystemTap
http://sourceware.org/systemtap/ Infrastructuretoaddinstrumentationtoarunningkernel: tracefunctions,readandwritevariables,followpointers,gatherstatistics... Eliminatestheneedtomodifythekernelsourcestoaddone'sowninstrumentationto investigatedafunctionalorperformanceproblem. Usesasimplescriptinglanguage. Severalexamplescriptsandprobepointsareavailable. BasedontheKprobesinstrumentationinfrastructure. Linux2.6.20:supportedonmostpopularCPUs. armandmipspatchesavailablefromhttp://elinux.org/Patch_Archive
235
SystemTapscriptexample(1)
#!/usr/bin/envstap #!/usr/bin/envstap #Usingstatisticsandmapstoexaminekernelmemoryallocations #Usingstatisticsandmapstoexaminekernelmemoryallocations globalkmalloc globalkmalloc probekernel.function("__kmalloc"){ probekernel.function("__kmalloc"){ kmalloc[execname()]<<<$size kmalloc[execname()]<<<$size } } #Exitafter10seconds #Exitafter10seconds probetimer.ms(10000){exit()} probetimer.ms(10000){exit()} probeend{ probeend{ foreach([name]inkmalloc){ foreach([name]inkmalloc){ printf("Allocationsfor%s\n",name) printf("Allocationsfor%s\n",name) printf("Count:%dallocations\n",@count(kmalloc[name])) printf("Count:%dallocations\n",@count(kmalloc[name])) printf("Sum:%dKbytes\n",@sum(kmalloc[name])/1000) printf("Sum:%dKbytes\n",@sum(kmalloc[name])/1000) printf("Average:%dbytes\n",@avg(kmalloc[name])) printf("Average:%dbytes\n",@avg(kmalloc[name])) printf("Min:%dbytes\n",@min(kmalloc[name])) printf("Min:%dbytes\n",@min(kmalloc[name])) printf("Max:%dbytes\n",@max(kmalloc[name])) printf("Max:%dbytes\n",@max(kmalloc[name])) print("\nAllocationsbysizeinbytes\n") print("\nAllocationsbysizeinbytes\n") print(@hist_log(kmalloc[name])) print(@hist_log(kmalloc[name])) printf("\n\n"); printf("\n\n"); } } } }
236
SystemTapscriptexample(2)
#!/usr/bin/envstap #!/usr/bin/envstap #Logseachfilereadperformedbyeachprocess #Logseachfilereadperformedbyeachprocess probekernel.function("vfs_read") probekernel.function("vfs_read") { { dev_nr=$file>f_dentry>d_inode>i_sb>s_dev dev_nr=$file>f_dentry>d_inode>i_sb>s_dev inode_nr=$file>f_dentry>d_inode>i_ino inode_nr=$file>f_dentry>d_inode>i_ino printf("%s(%d)%s0x%x/%d\n", printf("%s(%d)%s0x%x/%d\n", execname(),pid(),probefunc(),dev_nr,inode_nr) execname(),pid(),probefunc(),dev_nr,inode_nr) } }
Nicetutorialonhttp://sources.redhat.com/systemtap/tutorial.pdf
237
DebuggingwithFtrace(1)
Itisaselfcontainedsolution,requiringnouserspacetools orsupport. Itisusefulfortrackingdownproblems,notonlyinthe kernel,butinitsinteractionswithuserspaceaswell. Namecomesfrom"functiontracer",whichwasitsoriginal purpose,butitcandomorethanthat. Additionaltracershavebeenaddedtolookatthingslike contextswitches,howlonginterruptsaredisabled,howlong ittakesforhighprioritytaskstorunaftertheyhavebeen wokenup,andsoon.
238
DebuggingwithFtrace(2)
EnablethefollowingoptioninthekerneltouseFtrace:
CONFIG_FUNCTION_TRACER CONFIG_FUNCTION_GRAPH_TRACER CONFIG_STACK_TRACER CONFIG_DYNAMIC_TRACE
Withdynamictraceoption,mcount()callsarenop,andonly whenthefunction(orfunctiongraph)tracerisenabledthey arereplacedbythetracecode.
239
UsingFtrace(1)
Viewtraceravailableviadebugfs:
#cat/debug/tracing/available_tracers powerwakeupirqsofffunctionsysprofsched_switch initcallnopfunction_graph
Enablingtracer:
#echofunction>/debug/tracing/current_tracer #echo1>/debug/tracing/tracing_on ...somecommandsoractivitytotrace... #echo0>/debug/tracing/tracing_on
Thisproducesatraceofeachkernelfunctioncalled,along withatimestamp,whichwillallowakernelhackertosee whatisgoingoninsidethekernel.

240
UsingFtrace(2)
Outputfromftracecanbereadfromoneofseveralfilesin thetracingdirectory:
trace:containshumanreadableoutputofthetrace latency_trace:outputfromthesametrace,butorganizedso thatsystemlatencyissuescanbediagnosed,alsoinhuman readableformat trace_pipe:containsthesameoutputastrace,butismeantto bepipedintoacommand.Unliketheothertwo,readingfrom thisfileconsumestheoutput.
241
UsingFtrace(3)
tracing_enabledgovernswhetherfunctionentryisrecorded aspartofthetrace.Toenableit: echo1>/debug/tracing/tracing_enabled Wecanusefilterstoselectonlysomefunctionstotraceorto excludethemfromthetraceactivity:
echo'sys_*'>/debug/tracing/set_ftrace_filter echo'sys_*'>/debug/tracing/set_ftrace_nofilter
242
Ftraceoutput
tracefile:
#tracer:function # #TASKPIDCPU#TIMESTAMPFUNCTION #||||| bash3330[000]147.799029:sys_open<syscall_call bash3330[000]147.799030:do_sys_open<sys_open bash3330[000]147.799030:getname<do_sys_open bash3330[000]147.799031:kmem_cache_alloc<getname
243
Ftraceoutput(2)
latency_tracefile:
#tracer:function # functionlatencytracev1.1.5on2.6.290.215.rc7.fc11.i586 latency:0us,#120119/5425477,CPU#0|(M:desktopVP:0,KP:0,SP:0HP:0#P:2) |task:0(uid:0nice:0policy:0rt_prio:0) #_=>CPU# #/_=>irqsoff #|/_=>needresched #||/_=>hardirq/softirq #|||/_=>preemptdepth #||||/ #|||||delay #cmdpid|||||time|caller #\/|||||\|/ bash33300....3531221us:sys_open(syscall_call) bash33300....3531222us:do_sys_open(sys_open) bash33300....3531222us:getname(do_sys_open) bash33300....3531223us:kmem_cache_alloc(getname)
244
OtherFtracetracers
power:tracestheCPUpowerstatetransitions function_graph:tracesbothfunctionentryandexit,whichallowsa callgraphtobegenerated sysprof:periodically(governedbysysprof_sample_period) generatestacktracesfortherunningprocessorkernelthread initcall:tracestheentryandexitofinitializationfunctioncalls duringsystemboot branch:tracesbranchpredictionandexecution hwbranchtracer:usestheBranchTargetStack(BTS)featureof x86CPUstotracebranchexecution mmiotrace:tracesmemorymappedI/O
245
Usingtrace_printk()(1)
printk()hasaproblem:ifyouaredebuggingahigh volumeareaitcanleadtoboggingdownthesystemorcan evencreatealivelock. Itisalsoquitecommontoseeabug"disappear"whenadding afewprintk().Thisisduetothesheeroverheadthatit introduces!! Writingwithtrace_printk()onlytakesaroundatenth ofamicrosecondorsoinsteadofseveralmillisecondsof printk(). trace_printk()writesinaringbufferandwecansee theoutputviatracefile. Itcanbeusedinanycontext.
246
Usingtrace_printk()(2)
Forexampleyoucanaddsomethinglikethistothekernelor module: trace_printk("readfoo%d\n",foo);
#cattrace #tracer:nop # #TASKPIDCPU#TIMESTAMPFUNCTION #||||| <...><1000>[001]17279.332920::readfoo15
247
Debugginguserspaceinteractions
WithFtracewecaninaveryeasywaydebugapplications andwecanseetheapplication/kernelinteractions. ToperformitourapplicationcanwritedirectlyintheFtrace ringbufferviatrace_markerfile. Noticethatthewritestotrace_markerareshowedupas commentsinthefunctiongraphtracer. Whenweusemulticoreenvironmentitusefultoreadthe traceviaper_cputrace.Theper_cputracefilesarelocatedin thedebugfstracingdirectoryunderper_cpu. ThereexistsatracefileineachoneoftheseCPUdirectories thatonlyshowthetraceforthatCPU.
248
Ftraceonoops
Whenftrace_dump_on_oopsisenabledinthekernel bootparameters,orbyechoinga"1"into /proc/sys/kernel/ftrace_dump_on_oops, Ftracecandumptotheconsoletheentiretracebufferon oopsorpanic. Havingtheconsoleoutputtoaseriallogmakesdebugging crashesmucheasier.Youcannowtracebacktheeventsthat leduptothecrash. Dumpingtotheconsolemaytakealongtimesincethe defaultFtraceringbufferisoveramegabyteperCPU.To shrinkthesize,writethenumberofkilobytesyouwantthe ringbuffertobetobuffer_size_kb.
249
UsingMagicSysRq
Linuxalsohas3fingerkeystosaveyourwork Allowstorunmultipledebug/rescuecommandsevenwhenthekernel seemstobeindeeptrouble.Examplecommands: [ALT][SysRq][d]:killsallprocesses,exceptinit. [ALT][SysRq][n]:makesRTprocessesniceable. [ALT][SysRq][s]:attemptstosyncallmountedfilesystems. [ALT][SysRq][b]:immediatelyrebootwithoutsyncingand unmounting. Typicalcombination:[ALT][SysRq][s] andthen[ALT][SysRq][b] DetailedinDocumentation/sysrq.txt
250
DebugwithJTAG
FortheFOSScommunity,bestdonewithOpenOCD (OpenOnChipDebugger):http://openocd.berlios.de/web/ OpenOCDsupportsmultipleJTAGhardwaredongles. OpenOCDcaneitherbeinterfacedbyaserialconsole,adebugger,orbyanEclipse basedinterface. Ofcourse,itsupportsallthecapabilitiesofferedbyaJTAGinterface. Seetheverycompletedocumentation:http://openocd.berlios.de/doc/ Foreachboard,you'llneedanOpenOCDconfigurationfile(askyoursupplier) SeeveryusefuldetailsonusingEclipse/gcc/gdb/OpenOCDonWindows: http://www2.amontec.com/sdk4arm/ext/jlynchtutorial20061124.pdfand http://www.yagarto.de/howto/yagarto2/
251
__log_buf
Incaseofveryearlysystemcrash,thekernelcanhangbefore printingtheerrormessageontheconsole. Toseethemessagesstoredbykernel,butthatdon'tyetprinton theconsole,wecandumpthememorywithJTAG. Themessagesarestoredin__log_buf. Memoryaddresstouseistheaddressof__log_buf,wecan readitfromSystem.mapfile,butwehavetoconvertitfrom virtualtophysical. Toperformthatwecanseethecodeofvirt_to_phys() functionforourarchitectureinthekernel. Wecansetthelengthofthebufferinthekernelconfiguration underGeneralSetupmenu.
252
LTTng
http://ltt.polymtl.ca/ ThesuccessoroftheLinuxTraceToolkit(LTT) Toolkitallowingtocollectandanalyzetracinginformation fromthekernel,basedonkernelmarkersandkernel tracepoints. Sofar,basedonkernelpatches,butdoingitsbesttousein treesolutions,andtobemergedinthefuture. Veryprecisetimestamps,verylittleoverhead. Usefulguidelinesin http://ltt.polymtl.ca/svn/trunk/lttv/QUICKSTART
253
LTTV
ViewerforLTTngtraces Supportforhugetraces(testedwith15GBones). Cancombinemultipletracefilesinasingleview. Graphicalortextinterface. Seehttp://ltt.polymtl.ca/lttvdoc/user_guide/
254
Morekerneldebuggingtips
EnableCONFIG_KALLSYMS_ALL (GeneralSetup>Configurestandardkernelfeatures) togetoopsmessageswithsymbolnamesinsteadofrawaddresses (thisobsoletestheksymoopstool). Ifyourkerneldoesn'tbootyetorhangswithoutanymessage,youcanactivate LowLeveldebugging(KernelHackingsection,onlyavailableonarm): CONFIG_DEBUG_LL=y Moreaboutkerneldebugginginthefree LinuxDeviceDriversbook(Referencessection)!
255
Kernelerrors
KernelOops! Softerrorcondition,thesystemusuallywillbestillupand running. KernelPanic Criticalerrorcondition,thesystemwillberebootedaftera configurabletimeout. Sometimesisuseful,togranthighavailabilityandstability, tomanageoopslikekernelpanic.
256
Quickkerneldebugging(1)
Unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at virtual address 00000e14 printing eip: c0162887 OOPS! *pde = 00000000 Oops: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT Modules linked in: eeprom snd_seq_oss snd_seq_midi_event.......... CPU: 0 EIP: 0060:[<c0162887>] Not tainted EIP information EFLAGS: 00010206 (2.6.7-nf2) EIP is at prune_dcache+0x147/0x1c0 eax: 00000e00 ebx: d1bde050 ecx: f1b3c050 edx: f1b3ac50 esi: f1b3ac40 edi: c1973000 ebp: 00000036 esp: c1973ef8 ds: 007b es: 007b ss: 0068 Process kswapd0 (pid: 65, threadinfo=c1973000 task=c1986050) Stack: d7721178 c1973ef8 0000007a 00000000 c1973000 f7ffea48 c0162d1f 0000007a c0139a2b 0000007a 000000d0 00025528 049dbb00 00000000 000001fa 00000000 c0364564 00000001 0000000a c0364440 c013add1 00000080 000000d0 00000000 Call Trace: Call Trace [<c0162d1f>] shrink_dcache_memory+0x1f/0x30 [<c0139a2b>] shrink_slab+0x14b/0x190 ........................... Code: 8b 50 14 85 d2 75 27 89 34 24 e8 4a 2b 00 00 8b 73 0c 89 1c
257
prune_dcache()isdefinedinfs/dcache.c #objdumpdfs/dcache.o>fs/dcache.disasm #makefs/dcache.s Nowinfs/wehave:
dcache.csourcecode dcache.ocompiledobjectfile dcache.sassembleroutputofCcompiler('halfcompiled' code) dcache.disasmdisasembledobjectfile
258
Opendcache.disasmandfind"prune_dcache" 00000540<prune_dcache>: 540:55push%ebp Weneedtofindprune_dcache+0x147.Usingshell, #printf"0x%x\n"$((0x540+0x147)) 0x687
259
andindcache.disasm:
683:85c0test%eax,%eax
685:7407je68e<prune_dcache+0x14e> 687:8b5014mov0x14(%eax),%edx 68a:85d2test%edx,%edx 68c:7527jne6b5<prune_dcache+0x175> 68e:893424mov%esi,(%esp) 691:e8fcffffffcall692<prune_dcache+0x152> 696:8b730cmov0xc(%ebx),%esi 699:891c24mov%ebx,(%esp) 69c:e89ff9ffffcall40<d_free>
OOPS
Comparingwith"Code:8b501485d27527"match!
260
Weneedtofindmatchinglineindcache.sand,eventually,in dcache.c. It'seasytofindprune_dcacheindcache.s:
.L517: movl68(%ebx),%eax testl%eax,%eax je.L532 movl20(%eax),%edx testl%edx,%edx jne.L594
OOPS
261
NowwecanfindtheassemblerlineintheCcodewitha trick:wecanuseasm(#A),asm(#B)andsoon.
staticinlinevoiddentry_iput(structdentry*dentry)
{ ........................... asm(#A); if(dentry>d_op&&dentry>d_op>d_iput) { asm("#B"); dentry>d_op>d_iput(dentry,inode); } else ..............................

262
Whichcorrespondstothispartofnewdcache.s:
.L517: #APP #A #NO_APP movl68(%ebx),%eax testl%eax,%eax je.L532 movl20(%eax),%edx testl%edx,%edx jne.L594 .L532: #APP #B #NO_APP.
OOPS
263
Thisis"if(dentry>d_op&&dentry>d_op>d_iput)" conditioncheck,anditisoopsingtryingtodosecondcheck. dentry>d_opcontainsboguspointervalue0x00000e00!!! InalternativewecanuseafeatureofGCCtobeabletomix Candassemblercode: gcccdcache.cgWa,a,ad>dcache.s Examplefrom:http://kerneltrap.org/node/3648

264
Postmortemdebugging
Forthekernel:kdump. Fortheapplications:Elfcoredumps. Dumpscanbereallybig,even100MB! Alternativeapproach:useacustomtooltoselectonly relevantinformation. DisableElfcoredumpssupportinthekernel.
265
Libcrash
Createadebugprocessconnectedtotheapplicationviapipe. Whenthecrashhappensdebugprocessgathersalltherelevant informationanditsavesthem. TransparentapproachusingLDpreloading. Itusedecentralizedapproach,butitcouldbeusedtocreatea centralprocessthatmangesalltheinformation. See
http://tuxology.net/lectures/crashandburnwritinglinuxapplicationfaulthandlers/
266
DebuggingwithKprobes
Kprobesareabletocollectdebuggingandperformance informationwithverylowoverheadoveranykernelroutine. Wecaninsertpreandposthandlersoverakernelroutine, caughtitsreturnaddressorbypassitwritinganewonewith thesamesignature. TherearethreetypesofKprobes:
Kernelprobe:itcanbeinsertedonvirtuallyanyinstructioninthekernel. Jumpprobe:itisinsertedattheentrytoakernelfunction,andprovides convenientaccesstothefunction'sarguments. Returnprobe:itfireswhenaspecifiedfunctionreturns.
WecoulduseKprobesascoarsekernelpatchingtechnique.
267
ConfiguringKprobes
EnableCONFIG_KPROBESunderInstrumentationSupport. NowwecanloadandunloadKprobesbasedmodules! Ifweusethefunctionsymbolnamethenwehavetoenable CONFIG_KALLSYMSandCONFIG_KALLSYMS_ALL orwecanusetheSystemMaptofindtheroutineaddress. Wecaninsertaprobeinthemiddleofafunction,ifwe compilethekernelwithdebuginformation,sowecanuse objdumpdlvmlinuxtoseethesourcetoobject codemapping. Moreinformation:Documentation/Kprobe.txt
268
EmbeddedLinuxDevelopment
Driverdevelopment
Processesandscheduling
269
Processes
Aprocessisaninstanceofarunningprogram Multipleinstancesofthesameprogramcanberunning. Programcode(textsection)memoryisshared. Eachprocesshasitsowndatasection,addressspace, processorstate,openfilesandpendingsignals. Thekernelhasaseparatedatastructureforeachprocess.
270
Threads
InLinux,threadsarejustimplementedasprocesses! Newthreadsareimplementedasregularprocesses, withtheparticularitythattheyarecreatedwiththesame addressspace,filesystemresources,filedescriptorsand signalhandlersastheirparentprocess.
271
Aprocesslife
Parentprocess Parentprocess Callsfork()
Callsfork() andcreates andcreates anewprocess anewprocess Theprocessiselected bythescheduler Taskterminatedbutits resourcesarenotfreedyet. resourcesarenotfreedyet. Waitingforitsparent Waitingforitsparent toacknowledgeitsdeath. toacknowledgeitsdeath.
EXIT_ZOMBIE EXIT_ZOMBIE Taskterminatedbutits
TASK_RUNNING TASK_RUNNING Readybut

Readybut notrunning notrunning Theprocessispreempted bytoschedulertorun ahigherprioritytask
TASK_RUNNING TASK_RUNNING Actuallyrunning

Actuallyrunning
Theeventoccurs ortheprocessreceives asignal.Processbecomes runnableagain
TASK_INTERRUPTIBLE, TASK_INTERRUPTIBLE, TASK_UNINTERRUPTIBLE, TASK_UNINTERRUPTIBLE, TASK_KILLABLE TASK_KILLABLE Waiting

Waiting
Decidestosleep onawaitqueue foraspecificevent
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Processcontext
Userspaceprogramsandsystemcallsarescheduledtogether
Processexecutinginuserspace... (canbepreempted) Systemcall orexception
Processcontinuinginuserspace... (orreplacedbyahigherpriorityprocess) (canbepreempted)
Kernelcodeexecuted onbehalfofuserspace (canbepreemptedtoo!)
Stillhasaccesstoprocess data(openfiles...)
273
Kernelthreads
Thekerneldoesnotonlyreactfromuserspace(systemcalls,exceptions) orhardwareevents(interrupts).Italsorunsitsownprocesses. Kernelthreadsarestandardprocessesscheduledandpreemptedinthesame way(youcanviewthemwithtoporps!)Theyjusthavenospecial addressspaceandusuallyrunforever. Kernelthreadexamples: pdflush:regularlyflushesdirtymemorypagestodisk (filechangesnotcommittedtodiskyet). migration/<n>:PerCPUthreadstomigrateprocessesbetween processors,tobalanceCPUloadbetweenprocessors.
274
Processpriorities
Regularprocesses Prioritiesfrom20(maximum)to19(minimum) Onlyrootcansetnegativepriorities (rootcangiveanegativeprioritytoaregularuserprocess) Usethenicecommandtorunajobwithagivenpriority: nicen<priority><command> Usetherenicecommandtochangeaprocesspriority: renice<priority>p<pid>
275
Realtimepriorities
ProcesseswithrealtimeprioritycanbestartedbyrootusingthePOSIXAPI Availablethrough<sched.h>(seemansched.hfordetails) 100realtimeprioritiesavailable SCHED_FIFOschedulingclass: TheprocessrunsuntilcompletionunlessitisblockedbyanI/O,voluntarily relinquishestheCPU,orispreemptedbyahigherpriorityprocess. SCHED_RRschedulingclass: Difference:theprocessesarescheduledinaRoundRobinway. Eachprocessisrununtilitexhaustsamaxtimequantum.Thenother processeswiththesamepriorityarerun,andsoandso...
276
Timerfrequency
TimerinterruptsareraisedeveryHZthofsecond(=1jiffy) HZisnowconfigurable(inProcessortypeandfeatures): 100,250(i386default),300or1000(architecturedependent) Seekernel/Kconfig.hz. Compromisebetweensystemresponsivenessandglobalthroughput. Caution:notanyvaluecanbeused.Constraintsapply! AnotherideaistocompletelyturnoffCPUtimerinterruptswhenthesystemis idle(dynamictick).Thiscapabilityisavailablesince2.6.21,togetherwithhigh resolutiontimers. Seeourhttp://freeelectrons.com/articles/realtimepresentationfordetails.
277
Timeslices
Theschedulerprioritizeshighpriorityprocesses bygivingthemabiggertimeslice. Initialprocesstimeslice:parent'stimeslicesplitin2 (otherwiseprocesswouldcheatbyforking). Minimumpriority:5msor1jiffy(whicheverislarger) Defaultpriorityinjiffies:100ms Maximumpriority:800ms Note:actuallydependsonHZ. Seekernel/sched.cfordetails.
278
Whenisschedulingrun?
Eachprocesshasaneed_reschedflagwhichisset: Afteraprocessexhausteditstimeslice. Afteraprocesswithahigherpriorityisawakened. Thisflagischecked(possiblycausingtheexecutionofthescheduler) Whenreturningtouserspacefromasystemcall Whenreturningfrominterrupts(includingthecputimer), whenkernelpreemptionisenabled. Schedulingalsohappenswhenkernelcodeexplicitlyruns schedule()orexecutesanactionthatsleeps.
279
Driverdevelopment
Sleeping
280
Sleeping
Sleepingisneededwhenaprocess(userspaceorkernelspace) iswaitingfordata.
Userspaceprocess... readdevicefile Systemcall... askfor data sleep wakeup Interrupt handler datareadynotification
Other processes are scheduled ...Systemcall
...Userspace return
281
Howtosleep(1)
Mustdeclareawaitqueue Staticqueuedeclaration DECLARE_WAIT_QUEUE_HEAD(module_queue); Ordynamicqueuedeclaration wait_queue_head_tqueue; init_waitqueue_head(&queue);
282
Howtosleep(2)
Severalwaystomakeakernelprocesssleep
wait_event(queue,condition); SleepsuntilthegivenCexpressionistrue. Caution:can'tbeinterrupted(i.e.bykillingtheclientprocessinuserspace) wait_event_interruptible(queue,condition); Canbeinterrupted wait_event_timeout(queue,condition,timeout); Sleepsandautomaticallywakesupafterthegiventimeout. wait_event_interruptible_timeout(queue,condition,
timeout);
Sameasabove,interruptible. wait_event_killable(queue,condition); Sameaswait_event,buttheprocesscanreceivethesigkillsignal.

283
HowtosleepExample
Fromdrivers/ieee1394/video1394.c wait_event_interruptible( d>waitq, (d>buffer_status[v.buffer] ==VIDEO1394_BUFFER_READY) ); if(signal_pending(current)) returnEINTR;
Currentlyrunningprocess
284
Wakingup!
Typicallydonebyinterrupthandlerswhendatasleeping processesarewaitingforareavailable. wake_up(queue); Wakesupallthewaitingprocessesonthegivenqueue wake_up_interruptible(queue); Doesthesamejob.Usuallycalledwhenprocesseswaited usingwait_event_interruptible.
285
Sleepingandwakingupimplementation
Theschedulerdoesn'tkeepevaluatingthesleepingcondition! wait_event_interruptible(queue,condition); TheprocessisputintheTASK_INTERRUPTIBLEstate. wake_up_interruptible(queue); Forallprocesseswaitinginqueue,conditionisevaluated. Whenitevaluatestotrue,theprocessisputback totheTASK_RUNNINGstate,andtheneed_reschedflagfor thecurrentprocessisset. Thisway,severalprocessescanbewokenupatthesametime.
286
Driverdevelopment
Interruptmanagement
287
Interrupthandlerconstraints
Notrunfromausercontext: Can'ttransferdatatoandfromuserspace (needtobedonebysystemcallhandlers) InterrupthandlerexecutionismanagedbytheCPU,notby thescheduler.Handlerscan'trunactionsthatmaysleep, becausethereisnothingtoresumetheirexecution. Inparticular,needtoallocatememorywithGFP_ATOMIC. Havetocompletetheirjobquicklyenough: theyshouldn'tblocktheirinterruptlinefortoolong.
288
Registeringaninterrupthandler(1)
Definedininclude/linux/interrupt.h intrequest_irq( Returns0ifsuccessful unsignedintirq, Requestedirqchannel irqreturn_thandler, Interrupthandler unsignedlongirq_flags, Optionmask(seenextpage) constchar*devname, Registeredname void*dev_id); Pointertosomehandlerdata CannotbeNULLandmustbeuniqueforsharedirqs! voidfree_irq(unsignedintirq,void*dev_id); dev_idcannotbeNULLandmustbeuniqueforsharedirqs. Otherwise,onasharedinterruptline, free_irqwouldn'tknowwhichhandlertofree.
289
Registeringaninterrupthandler(2)
irq_flagsbitvalues(canbecombined,noneisfinetoo) IRQF_DISABLED "Quick"interrupthandler.Runwithallinterruptsdisabledonthecurrentcpu (insteadofjustthecurrentline).Forlatencyreasons,shouldonlybeusedwhen needed! IRQF_SHARED Runwithinterruptsdisabledonlyonthecurrentirqlineandonthelocalcpu. Theinterruptchannelcanbesharedbyseveraldevices. RequiresahardwarestatusregistertellingwhetheranIRQwasraisedornot. IRQF_SAMPLE_RANDOM Interruptscanbeusedtocontributetothesystementropypoolusedby /dev/randomand/dev/urandom.Usefultogenerategoodrandomnumbers. Don'tusethisiftheinterruptbehaviorofyourdeviceispredictable!
290
Informationoninstalledhandlers
/proc/interrupts
CPU0 0:5616905XTPICtimer#Registeredname 1:9828XTPICi8042 2:0XTPICcascade 3:1014243XTPICorinoco_cs 7:184XTPICIntel82801DBICH4 8:1XTPICrtc 9:2XTPICacpi 11:566583XTPICehci_hcd,uhci_hcd, uhci_hcd,uhci_hcd,yenta,yenta,radeon@PCI:1:0:0 12:5466XTPICi8042 14:121043XTPICide0 15:200888XTPICide1 NMI:0 NonMaskableInterrupts ERR:0 Spuriousinterruptcount
291
Totalnumberofinterrupts
cat/proc/stat|grepintr intr819076760929671037701102775520196...
Totalnumber ofinterrupts IRQ1 total IRQ2 IRQ3 total ...
292
Theinterrupthandler'sjob
Acknowledgetheinterrupttothedevice (otherwisenomoreinterruptswillbegenerated). Read/writedatafrom/tothedevice. Wakeupanywaitingprocesswaitingforthecompletionof thisread/writeoperation: wake_up_interruptible(&module_queue);
293
Interrupthandlerprototype
irqreturn_t(*handler)( int, //irqnumberofthecurrentinterrupt void*dev_id, //Pointerusedtokeeptrack //ofthecorrespondingdevice. //Usefulwhenseveraldevices //aremanagedbythesamemodule ); Returnvalue: IRQ_HANDLED:recognizedandhandledinterrupt. IRQ_NONE:notonadevicemanagedbythemodule.Usefultoshare interruptchannelsand/orreportspuriousinterruptstothekernel. IRQ_WAKE_THREAD:seenextslides.
294
ThreadedInterruptHandling(1)
Startingfrom2.6.30adevicedrivercanrequestthatitsmain interrupthandlerrunsinathread. Newfunctionrequest_threaded_irq()provided. Thehandlerfunctioniscalledinhardinterruptcontextand needstocheckwhethertheinterruptoriginatedfromthe device. Iftheinterruptoriginatedfromthedevicethenthehandler caneitherreturnIRQ_HANDLEDor IRQ_WAKE_THREAD. IRQ_HANDLEDisreturnedwhennofurtheractionis required.
295
ThreadedInterruptHandling(2)
IRQ_WAKE_THREADinvokesthethreaded(main) handler. WhenIRQ_WAKE_THREADisreturnedhandlermusthave disabledtheinterruptonthedevicelevel. Thisismandatoryforsharedinterrupthandlers,butitneedto doitaswellforobscurex86hardwarewheredisablingan interruptontheIO_APIClevelredirectstheinterrupttothe legacyPICinterruptlines.
296
Registeringathreadedinterrupthandler
Definedininclude/linux/interrupt.h intrequest_threaded_irq( Returns0ifsuccessful unsignedintirq, Requestedirqchannel irq_handler_thandler, Interrupthandler irq_handler_tthread_fn Interruptthreadfunction unsignedlongirq_flags, Optionmask(seenextpage) constchar*devname, Registeredname void*dev_id); Pointertosomehandlerdata CannotbeNULLandmustbeuniqueforsharedirqs!
297
Tophalfandbottomhalfprocessing(1)
Splittingtheexecutionofinterrupthandlersin2parts Tophalf:theinterrupthandlermustcompleteasquicklyas possible.Onceitacknowledgedtheinterrupt,itjust schedulesthelengthyrestofthejobtakingcareofthedata, foralaterexecution. Bottomhalf:completingtherestoftheinterrupthandlerjob. Handlesdata,andthenwakesupanywaitinguserprocess. Bestimplementedbytasklets(alsocalledsoftirqs).
298
tophalfandbottomhalfprocessing(2)
Declarethetaskletinthemodulesourcefile: DECLARE_TASKLET(module_tasklet,/*name*/ module_do_tasklet,/*function*/ 0/*data*/ ); Schedulethetaskletinthetophalfpart(interrupthandler): tasklet_schedule(&module_tasklet); Notethatatasklet_hi_schedulefunctionisavailableto definehighprioritytaskletstorunbeforeordinaryones. Bydefault,taskletsareexecutedrightafteralltophalves(hardirqs)
299
Disablinginterrupts
Maybeusefulinregulardrivercode... Canbeusefultoensurethataninterrupthandlerwillnotpreemptyour code(includingkernelpreemption). DisablinginterruptsonthelocalCPU:
unsignedlongflags; local_irq_save(flags); //Interruptsdisabled ... local_irq_restore(flags);//Interruptsrestoredtotheirpreviousstate.
Note:mustberunfromwithinthesamefunction!
300
Maskingoutaninterruptline
Usefultodisableinterruptsonaparticularline voiddisable_irq(unsignedintirq); Disablestheirqlineforallprocessorsinthesystem. Waitsforallcurrentlyexecutinghandlerstocomplete. voiddisable_irq_nosync(unsignedintirq); Same,exceptitdoesn'twaitforhandlerstocomplete. voidenable_irq(unsignedintirq); Restoresinterruptsontheirqline. voidsynchronize_irq(unsignedintirq); Waitsforirqhandlerstocomplete(ifany).
301
Checkinginterruptstatus
Canbeusefulforcodewhichcanberunfrombothprocessor interruptcontext,toknowwhetheritisallowedornottocall codethatmaysleep. irqs_disabled() Testswhetherlocalinterruptdeliveryisdisabled. in_interrupt() Testswhethercodeisrunningininterruptcontext. in_irq() Testswhethercodeisrunninginaninterrupthandler.
302
Interruptmanagementsummary
Devicedriver Whenthedevicefileisfirstopen orinthedriverinit,registeran interrupthandlerforthedevice's interruptchannel. Interrupthandler Calledwhenaninterruptisraised. Acknowledgetheinterrupt. Ifneeded,scheduleatasklettaking careofhandlingdata.Otherwise, wakeupprocesseswaitingforthe data. Tasklet Processthedata. Wakeupprocesseswaitingfor thedata. Devicedriver Whenthedeviceisnolonger openedbyanyprocessorinthe driverexit,unregisterthe interrupthandler.
303
Driverdevelopment
Concurrentaccesstoresources
304
Sourcesofconcurrencyissues
Thesameresourcescanbeaccessedbyseveralkernelprocessesin parallel,causingpotentialconcurrencyissues Severaluserspaceprogramsaccessingthesamedevicedataor hardware.Severalkernelprocessescouldexecutethesamecodeon behalfofuserprocessesrunninginparallel. Multiprocessing:thesamedrivercodecanberunningonanother processor.ThiscanalsohappenwithsingleCPUswithhyperthreading. Kernelpreemption,interrupts:kernelcodecanbeinterruptedatany time(justafewexceptions),andthesamedatamaybeaccessbyanother processbeforetheexecutioncontinues.
305
Avoidingconcurrencyissues
Avoidusingglobalvariablesandshareddatawheneverpossible (cannotbedonewithhardwareresources). Usetechniquestomanageconcurrentaccesstoresources. SeeRustyRussell'sUnreliableGuideToLocking Documentation/DocBook/kernellocking/ inthekernelsources.
306
Concurrencyprotectionwithlocks
Process1
Failed Acquirelock Success Criticalcodesection Tryagain Success
Waitlockrelease
Process2
Sharedresource
Releaselock
307
Linuxmutexes
ThemainlockingprimitivesinceLinux2.6.16. Betterthancountingsemaphoreswhenbinaryonesareenough. Mutexdefinition: #include<linux/mutex.h> Initializingamutexstatically: DEFINE_MUTEX(name); Orinitializingamutexdynamically: voidmutex_init(structmutex*lock);
308
lockingandunlockingmutexes
voidmutex_lock(structmutex*lock); Triestolockthemutex,sleepsotherwise. Caution:can'tbeinterrupted,resultinginprocessesyoucannotkill! intmutex_lock_interruptible(structmutex*lock); Same,butcanbeinterrupted.Ifinterrupted,returnsanonzerovalueand doesn'tholdthelock.Testthereturnvalue!!! intmutex_trylock(structmutex*lock); Neverwaits.Returnsanonzerovalueifthemutexisnotavailable. intmutex_is_locked(structmutex*lock); Justtellswhetherthemutexislockedornot. voidmutex_unlock(structmutex*lock); Releasesthelock.Makesureyoudoitasquicklyaspossible!
309
Reader/writersemaphores
Allowsharedaccessbyunlimitedreaders,orbyonly1writer.Writersget priority. voidinit_rwsem(structrw_semaphore*sem); voiddown_read(structrw_semaphore*sem); intdown_read_trylock(structrw_semaphore*sem); intup_read(structrw_semaphore*sem); voiddown_write(structrw_semaphore*sem); intdown_write_trylock(structrw_semaphore*sem); intup_write(structrw_semaphore*sem); Wellsuitedforrarewrites,holdingthesemaphorebriefly.Otherwise,readersget starved,waitingtoolongforthesemaphoretobereleased.
310
Whentousemutexesorsemaphores
Beforeandafteraccessingsharedresources. Insituationswhensleepingisallowed. Semaphoresandmutexesmustonlybeusedinprocess context(managedbythescheduler),andnotininterrupt context(managedbytheCPU,sleepingnotsupported).
311
Spinlocks
Lockstobeusedforcodethatisnotallowedtosleep(interrupt handlers),orthatdoesn'twanttosleep(criticalsections).Bevery carefulnottocallfunctionswhichcansleep! Originallyintendedformultiprocessorsystems. Spinlocksneversleepandkeepspinning inaloopuntilthelockisavailable.
Spinlock Stilllocked?
Spinlockscausekernelpreemptiontobedisabled ontheCPUexecutingthem.
312
Initializingspinlocks
Static spinlock_tmy_lock=SPIN_LOCK_UNLOCKED; Dynamic voidspin_lock_init(spinlock_t*lock);
313
Usingspinlocks(1)
Severalvariants,dependingonwherethespinlockiscalled: voidspin_[un]lock(spinlock_t*lock); Doesn'tdisableinterrupts.Usedforlockinginprocesscontext (criticalsectionsinwhichyoudonotwanttosleep). voidspin_lock_irqsave/spin_unlock_irqrestore (spinlock_t*lock,unsignedlongflags); Disables/restoresIRQsonthelocalCPU. Typicallyusedwhenthelockcanbeaccessedinbothprocessand interruptcontext,topreventpreemptionbyinterrupts.
314
Usingspinlocks(2)
voidspin_[un]lock_bh(spinlock_t*lock); Disablessoftwareinterrupts,butnothardwareones. Usefultoprotectshareddataaccessedinprocesscontext andinasoftinterrupt(bottomhalf).Noneedtodisablehardware interruptsinthiscase. Notethatreader/writerspinlocksalsoexist.
315
Deadlocksituations
Theycanlockupyoursystem.Makesuretheyneverhappen!
Don'tcallafunctionthatcantry togetaccesstothesamelock Holdingmultiplelocksisrisky!
Getlock1 Getlock1 call Getlock2 Waitforlock1

Dead Lock!
Getlock2
Dead Lock!
Getlock1
316
Kernellockvalidator
FromIngoMolnarandArjanvandeVen Addsinstrumentationtokernellockingcode. Detectviolationsoflockingrulesduringsystemlife,suchas: Locksacquiredindifferentorder (keepstrackoflockingsequencesandcomparesthem). Spinlocksacquiredininterrupthandlersandalsoinprocesscontext wheninterruptsareenabled. Notsuitableforproductionsystemsbutacceptableoverheadin development. SeeDocumentation/lockdepdesign.txtfordetails
317
Alternativestolocking
Aswehavejustseen,lockingcanhaveastrongnegativeimpacton systemperformance.Insomesituations,youcoulddowithoutit. ByusinglockfreealgorithmslikeReadCopyUpdate(RCU). Whenavailable,useatomicoperations.
318
ReadCopyUpdate
Algorithmrequirements:
Referencestosharedresourcesviapointers. Wecanclearlysplittheprocessesinreadersandwriters. Mostoftimetherearereadoperations. Readerscanmanageolddata.
319
Howitworks(1)
Readerscallrcu_read_lock()beforeaccessingtothe resource. Readerscallrcu_dereference()togetapointertothe resource. Whentheyhavefinished,theycallrcu_read_unlock() Nocontentiononthesefunctionsbecausetheyarenottrue mutexesbuttheyworklikeflags. Tomodifyaresource,writersacquirealock(formorethan onewriter),theycopytheresourceandmodifyit,thenthey claimtheupdate.
320
Howitworks(2)
Readersalreadyinacriticalsectionwillseetheold resourceyet. Newreaders,aftertheupdate,willseethenewresource whentheywillenterinthecriticalsectionagain. Whenalloldreaderswillexitfromtheircriticalsection, theoldresourcewillbeerased.
321
UsingRCU
rcu_read_lock() Usedbyreaderstoenterinacriticalsection rcu_read_unlock() Usedbyreaderstoexitfromacriticalsection synchronize_rcu()/call_rcu() Usedbywritertobesynchronizedwithreadersanddeletethe oldresource rcu_assign_pointer() Usedbywritertochangethepointertothenewresource rcu_dereference() Usedbyreaderstogetareferencetotheresource
322
RCUReferences
Wikipediaarticle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RCU KernelDocumentationfolder Documentation/RCU/
323
Atomicvariables
Usefulwhenthesharedresourceisan integervalue. Evenaninstructionliken++isnot guaranteedtobeatomiconallprocessors! Header #include<asm/atomic.h> Type atomic_t containsasignedinteger(atleast24bits)
Operationswithoutreturnvalue:
voidatomic_inc(atomic_t*v); voidatomic_dec(atomic_t*v); voidatomic_add(inti,atomic_t*v); voidatomic_sub(inti,atomic_t*v);
Simularfunctionstestingtheresult:
intatomic_inc_and_test(...); intatomic_dec_and_test(...); intatomic_sub_and_test(...);
Functionsreturningthenewvalue:
intatomic_inc_and_return(...); intatomic_dec_and_return(...); intatomic_add_and_return(...); intatomic_sub_and_return(...);
Atomicoperations(mainones) Setorreadthecounter:
atomic_set(atomic_t*v,inti); intatomic_read(atomic_t*v);
324
Atomicbitoperations
Supplyveryfast,atomicoperations Onmostplatforms,applytoanunsignedlongtype. Applytoavoidtypeonafewothers. Set,clear,toggleagivenbit: voidset_bit(intnr,unsignedlong*addr); voidclear_bit(intnr,unsignedlong*addr); voidchange_bit(intnr,unsignedlong*addr); Testbitvalue: inttest_bit(intnr,unsignedlong*addr); Testandmodify(returnthepreviousvalue): inttest_and_set_bit(...); inttest_and_clear_bit(...); inttest_and_change_bit(...);
325
Driverdevelopment
mmap
326
mmap(1)
Possibilitytohavepartsofthevirtualaddressspaceofaprogram mappedtothecontentsofafile!
>cat/proc/1/maps(initprocess) startend permoffsetmajor:minorinodemappedfilename 007710000077f000rxp0000000003:051165839/lib/libselinux.so.1 0077f00000781000rwp0000d00003:051165839/lib/libselinux.so.1 0097d00000992000rxp0000000003:051158767/lib/ld2.3.3.so 0099200000993000rp0001400003:051158767/lib/ld2.3.3.so 0099300000994000rwp0001500003:051158767/lib/ld2.3.3.so 0099600000aac000rxp0000000003:051158770/lib/tls/libc2.3.3.so 00aac00000aad000rp0011600003:051158770/lib/tls/libc2.3.3.so 00aad00000ab0000rwp0011700003:051158770/lib/tls/libc2.3.3.so 00ab000000ab2000rwp00ab000000:000 0804800008050000rxp0000000003:05571452/sbin/init(text) 0805000008051000rwp0000800003:05571452/sbin/init(data,stack) 08b4300008b64000rwp08b4300000:000 f6fdf000f6fe0000rwpf6fdf00000:000 fefd4000ff000000rwpfefd400000:000 ffffe000fffff000p0000000000:000
327
mmap(2)
Particularlyusefulwhenthefileisadevicefile! AllowstoaccessdeviceI/Omemoryandportswithouthavingtogo through(expensive)read,writeorioctlcalls! Xserverexample(mapsexcerpt)
startend permoffsetmajor:minorinodemappedfilename 08047000081be000rxp0000000003:05310295/usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg 081be000081f0000rwp0017600003:05310295/usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg ... f4e08000f4f09000rwse000000003:05655295/dev/dri/card0 f4f09000f4f0b000rws4281a00003:05655295/dev/dri/card0 f4f0b000f6f0b000rwse800000003:05652822/dev/mem f6f0b000f6f8b000rwsfcff000003:05652822/dev/mem
Amoreuserfriendlywaytogetsuchinformation:pmap<pid>
328
mmapoverview
mmap system call(once)
Process
access virtual address
Devicedriver
mmapfopcalled initializesthemapping
MMU
access physical address
Processvirtualaddressspace
Physicaladdressspace
329
HowtoimplementmmapUserspace
Openthedevicefile Callthemmapsystemcall(seemanmmapfordetails): void*mmap( void*start, /*Often0,preferredstartingaddress*/ size_tlength, /*Lengthofthemappedarea*/ intprot, /*Permissions:read,write,execute*/ intflags, /*Options:sharedmapping,privatecopy...*/ intfd, /*Openfiledescriptor*/ off_toffset /*Offsetinthefile*/ ); Yougetavirtualaddressyoucanwritetoorreadfrom.
330
HowtoimplementmmapKernelspace
Characterdriver:implementammapfileoperation andaddittothedriverfileoperations:
int(*mmap)( structfile*, structvm_area_struct* ); /*Openfilestructure*/ /*KernelVMAstructure*/
Initializethemapping. Canbedoneinmostcaseswiththeremap_pfn_range() function,whichtakescareofmostofthejob.
331
remap_pfn_range()
pfn:pageframenumber Themostsignificantbitsofthepageaddress (withoutthebitscorrespondingtothepagesize). #include<linux/mm.h> intremap_pfn_range( structvm_area_struct*, /*VMAstruct*/ unsignedlongvirt_addr, /*Startinguservirtualaddress*/ unsignedlongpfn, /*pfnofthestartingphysicaladdress*/ unsignedlongsize, /*Mappingsize*/ pgprot_t /*Pagepermissions*/ );
332
Simplemmapimplementation
staticintacme_mmap( structfile*file,structvm_area_struct*vma) { size=vma>vm_startvma>vm_end; if(size>ACME_SIZE) returnEINVAL; if(remap_pfn_range(vma, vma>vm_start, ACME_PHYS>>PAGE_SHIFT, size, vma>vm_page_prot)) returnEAGAIN; return0; }
333
devmem2
http://freeelectrons.com/pub/mirror/devmem2.c,byJanDerkBakker Veryusefultooltodirectlypeek(read)orpoke(write)I/Oaddresses mappedinphysicaladdressspacefromashellcommandline! Veryusefulforearlyinteractionexperimentswithadevice,without havingtocodeandcompileadriver. Usesmmapto/dev/mem. Examples(b:byte,h:half,w:word) devmem20x000c0004h(reading) devmem20x000c0008w0xffffffff(writing)
334
mmapsummary
Thedevicedriverisloaded. Itdefinesanmmapfileoperation. Auserspaceprocesscallsthemmapsystemcall. Themmapfileoperationiscalled. Itinitializesthemappingusingthedevicephysicaladdress. Theprocessgetsastartingaddresstoreadfromandwriteto(depending onpermissions). TheMMUautomaticallytakescareofconvertingtheprocessvirtual addressesintophysicalones. Directaccesstothehardware! Noexpensivereadorwritesystemcalls!
335
Driverdevelopment
DMA
336
DMAmemoryconstraints
Needtousecontiguousmemoryinphysicalspace. Canuseanymemoryallocatedbykmalloc(upto128KB). CanuseblockI/Oandnetworkingbuffers, designedtosupportDMA. Maynotusevmallocmemory (wouldhavetosetupDMAoneachindividualpage).
337
ReservingmemoryforDMA
Tomakesureyou'vegotenoughRAMforbigDMAtransfers... Exampleassumingyouhave32MBofRAM,andneed2MBfor DMA: Bootyourkernelwithmem=30 Thekernelwilljustusethefirst30MBofRAM. Drivercodecannowreclaimthe2MBleft: dmabuf=ioremap( 0x1e00000, /*Start:30MB*/ 0x200000 /*Size:2MB*/ );
338
Memorysynchronizationissues
MemorycachingcouldinterferewithDMA BeforeDMAtodevice: NeedtomakesurethatallwritestoDMAbufferarecommitted. AfterDMAfromdevice: BeforedriversreadfromDMAbuffer,needtomakesurethat memorycachesareflushed. BidirectionalDMA NeedtoflushcachesbeforeandaftertheDMAtransfer.
339
LinuxDMAAPI
ThekernelDMAutilitiescantakecareof: Eitherallocatingabufferinacachecoherentarea, Ormakesurecachesareflushedwhenrequired, ManagingtheDMAmappingsandIOMMU(ifany). SeeDocumentation/DMAAPI.txt fordetailsabouttheLinuxDMAgenericAPI. Mostsubsystems(suchasPCIorUSB)supplytheirownDMAAPI, derivedfromthegenericone.Maybesufficientformostneeds.
340
LimitedDMAaddressrange?
Bydefault,thekernelassumesthatyourdevice canDMAtoany32bitaddress.Nottrueforalldevices! Totellthekernelthatitcanonlyhandle24bitaddresses: if(dma_set_mask(dev, /*devicestructure*/ 0x00ffffff /*24bits*/ )) use_dma=1; /*AbletouseDMA*/ else use_dma=0; /*WillhavetodowithoutDMA*/
341
CoherentorstreamingDMAmappings
Coherentmappings Thekernelallocatesasuitablebuffer andsetsthemappingforthedriver. Cansimultaneouslybeaccessedby theCPUanddevice. So,hastobeinacachecoherent memoryarea. Usuallyallocatedforthewholetime themoduleisloaded. Canbeexpensivetosetupanduse onsomeplatforms. Streamingmappings Thekerneljustsetsthemappingfora bufferprovidedbythedriver. Useabufferalreadyallocated bythedriver. Mappingsetupforeachtransfer. KeepsDMAregistersfreeonthe hardware. Someoptimizationsalsoavailable. Therecommendedsolution.
342
Allocatingcoherentmappings
Thekerneltakescareofboththebufferallocationandmapping: include<asm/dmamapping.h> void* /*Output:bufferaddress*/ dma_alloc_coherent( structdevice*dev, /*devicestructure*/ size_tsize, /*Neededbuffersizeinbytes*/ dma_addr_t*handle,/*Output:DMAbusaddress*/ gfp_tgfp /*StandardGFPflags*/ ); voiddma_free_coherent(structdevice*dev, size_tsize,void*cpu_addr,dma_addr_thandle);
343
DMApools(1)
dma_alloc_coherentusuallyallocatesbufferswith __get_free_pages(minimum:1page). YoucanuseDMApoolstoallocatesmallercoherentmappings: <includelinux/dmapool.h> CreateaDMApool: structdma_pool* dma_pool_create( constchar*name, structdevice*dev, size_tsize, size_talign, size_tallocation );
/*Namestring*/ /*devicestructure*/ /*Sizeofpoolbuffers*/ /*Hardwarealignment(bytes)*/ /*Addressboundariesnottobecrossed*/
344
DMApools(2)
Allocatefrompool void*dma_pool_alloc( structdma_pool*pool, gfp_tmem_flags, dma_addr_t*handle );
Note
DMApoolsonly usedbyUSBcore and2SCSI drivers
Freebufferfrompool voiddma_pool_free( structdma_pool*pool, void*vaddr, dma_addr_tdma); Destroythepool(freeallbuffersfirst!) voiddma_pool_destroy(structdma_pool*pool);

345
Settingupstreamingmappings
Worksonbuffersalreadyallocatedbythedriver
<includelinux/dmapool.h> dma_addr_tdma_map_single( structdevice*, /*devicestructure*/ void*, /*input:buffertouse*/ size_t, /*buffersize*/ enumdma_data_direction /*EitherDMA_BIDIRECTIONAL, DMA_TO_DEVICEorDMA_FROM_DEVICE*/ ); voiddma_unmap_single(structdevice*dev,dma_addr_t handle,size_tsize,enumdma_data_directiondir);
346
DMAstreamingmappingnotes
Whenthemappingisactive:onlythedeviceshouldaccessthe buffer(potentialcacheissuesotherwise). TheCPUcanaccessthebufferonlyafterunmapping! UselockingtopreventCPUaccesstothebuffer. Anotherreason:ifrequired,thisAPIcancreateanintermediate bouncebuffer(usedifthegivenbufferisnotusableforDMA). TheLinuxAPIalsosupportsscatter/gatherDMAstreaming mappings.
347
DMAsummary
MostdriverscanusethespecificAPIprovidedbytheir subsystem:USB,PCI,SCSI...OtherwisetheycanusetheLinuxgenericAPI:
Coherentmappings DMAbufferallocatedbythekernel Setupforthewholemodulelife Canbeexpensive.Notrecommended. LetboththeCPUanddevice accessthebufferatthesametime. Mainfunctions: dma_alloc_coherent dma_free_coherent Streamingmappings DMAbufferallocatedbythedriver Setupforeachtransfer Cheaper.SavesDMAregisters. Onlythedevicecanaccessthebuffer whenthemappingisactive. Mainfunctions: dma_map_single dma_unmap_single
348
Driverdevelopment
Asyncoperations
349
Workqueue
Allowskernelcodetodeferprocessingtoalatertime. Workqueuesarecharacterizedbytheexistenceofoneormore dedicatedprocesseswhichexecutequeuedjobs. Workqueuescanalsodelaytheexecutionofspecificjobsfora callerspecifiedperiod. Taskletaresoftirq=>interruptcontext Workqueuesareexecutedbykernelthreads=>processcontext Workqueuescansleeponamutex.
350
Usingworkqueue
Runtimeinittheworkqueueforthefirsttime
INIT_WORK(structwork_structwork,work_func_t func);
Wherework_func_tis
typedefvoid(*work_func_t)(structwork_struct *work);
Createasingleworkqueuethread
create_singlethread_workqueue(name); Createarealtimeworkqueuethread create_rt_workqueue(name);
Queuethework
intqueue_work(structworkqueue_struct*queue, structwork_struct*work);
351
AsyncI/O
TwokindofasyncI/O:
fasyncmethod. Aiointerface(POSIX1.bstandard).
VeryusefultoperformnonblockingI/Ofromapplication pointofview. Applicationscouldparallelizetheirworkflow.
352
Fasync
Driversmustimplementfasyncmethodinthe file_operationsstruct: int(*fasync)(intfd,structfile *filp,intmode) Whendataarereadythedrivercallkill_fasyncand theapplicationsreceiveSIGIOsignal(default)as notification.
353
AIO
Driversmustimplementthreefunctionsinthe file_operationsstruct:
ssize_t(*aio_read)(structkiocb*,const structiovec*,unsignedlong,loff_t); ssize_t(*aio_write)(structkiocb*,const structiovec*,unsignedlong,loff_t); int(*aio_fsync)(structkiocb*,int datasync);
NotificationviacustomUnixsignalorwiththecreationofa threadtomanageit.
354
Asyncfunctioncalls
Codeinmainlinestartingfrom2.6.29,butit'senabledby defaultonlystartingfrom2.6.30. Designedtospeedupthebootprocess. Duringregularkernelboot,theseasynchronouscallsare actuallyexecutedsynchronously(fornow). Exampleuse:asyncprobingofSCSIdevice. Ifyouwantsimplytoschedulesomedelayedwork,use workqueuesinstead.
355
Driverdevelopment
NewDeviceModel
356
Unifieddevicemodel
The2.6kernelincludedasignificantnewfeature: aunifieddevicemodel. Insteadofhavingdifferentadhocmechanismsinthevarious subsystems,thedevicemodelunifiesthedescriptionofthe devicesandtheirtopology:
Minimizationofcodeduplication Commonfacilities(referencecounting,eventnotification, powermanagement,etc.) Enumeratethedevices,viewtheirinterconnections,linkthe devicestotheirbusesanddrivers,categorizethembyclasses
357
Busdrivers
Thefirstcomponentofthedevicemodelisthebusdriver.
Onebusdriverforeachtypeofbus:USB,PCI,SPI,MMC, ISA,etc.
Itisresponsiblefor:
Registeringthebustype. Allowingregistrationofadapterdrivers(USBcontrollers,I2C adapters,etc.),ableofdetectingtheconnecteddevices. Allowingregistrationofdevicedrivers(USBdevices,I2C devices,PCIdevices,etc.),managingthedevices. Matchingthedevicedriversagainstthedevicesdetectedbythe adapterdrivers.
358
Listofdeviceidentifiers
Dependingonthebustype,themethodforbindingadevice toadriverisdifferent.Formanybuses,itisbasedonunique identifiers. Thedevicedriverdefinesatablewiththelistofdevice identifiersitisabletomanage:
staticconststructpci_device_idrhine_pci_tbl[]={ {0x1106,0x3043,PCI_ANY_ID,PCI_ANY_ID,},/*VT86C100A*/ {0x1106,0x3053,PCI_ANY_ID,PCI_ANY_ID,},/*VT6105M*/ {}/*terminatelist*/ }; MODULE_DEVICE_TABLE(pci,rhine_pci_tbl);
Code on this slide and the next slides are taken from the via-rhine driver in drivers/net/viarhine.c
359
Definingthedriver
Thedevicedriverdefinesadriverstructure,usually specializedbythebusinfrastructure(pci_driver, usb_driver,etc.). Thestructurepointsto:thedevicetable,aprobefunction, calledwhenadeviceisdetectedandvariousothercallbacks
staticstructpci_driverrhine_driver={ .name=DRV_NAME, .id_table=rhine_pci_tbl, .probe=rhine_init_one, .remove=__devexit_p(rhine_remove_one), #ifdefCONFIG_PM .suspend=rhine_suspend, .resume=rhine_resume, #endif/*CONFIG_PM*/ .shutdown=rhine_shutdown, };
360
Registeringthedriver
Inthemoduleinitializationfunction,thedriverisregistered tothebusinfrastructure,inordertoletthebusknowthatthe driverisavailabletohandledevices.
staticint__initrhine_init(void) staticint__initrhine_init(void) { { [...] [...] returnpci_register_driver(&rhine_driver); returnpci_register_driver(&rhine_driver); } } staticvoid__exitrhine_cleanup(void) staticvoid__exitrhine_cleanup(void) { { pci_unregister_driver(&rhine_driver); pci_unregister_driver(&rhine_driver); } }
IfanewPCIdevicematchesoneoftheidentifiersofthe table,theprobe()methodofthePCIdriverwillgetcalled.
361
Probemethod
Theprobe()methodreceivesasargumentastructure describingthedevice,usuallyspecializedbythebus infrastructure(pci_dev,usb_device,etc.). Thisfunctionisresponsiblefor
Initializingthedevice,mappingtheI/Omemory,registering theinterrupthandlers.Thebusinfrastructureprovidesmethods togettheaddresses,interruptsnumbersandotherdevice specificinformation. Registeringthedevicetotheproperkernelframework,for examplethenetworkinfrastructure. It'saninitfunction!It'scalledprobeforhistoricalreasons.
362
Globalarchitecture
PCIbusdriver PCIbusdriver
Thedevice driver registersitself andthedevice identifiersto thebusdriver
Thebusdriver detectsamatching device,andcalls theprobe()method ofthedevice driver.
Network Network device device framework framework 3

Theprobe() methodofthe devicedriver initializesthe deviceandregisters anewnetwork interface
viarhine viarhine devicedriver devicedriver

363
sysfs
Thebus,device,drivers,etc.structuresareinternaltothekernel. Thesysfsvirtualfilesystemprovidesamechanismtoexportsuch informationtouserspace. Usedforexamplebyudevtoprovideautomaticmoduleloading, firmwareloading,devicefilecreation,etc.
sysfsisusuallymountedin/sys /sys/bus/containsthelistofbuses. /sys/devices/containsthelistofdevices.
/sys/classenumeratesdevicesbyclass(net,input,block...), whateverthebustheyareconnectedto.Veryuseful! Takeyourtimetoexplore/sysonyourworkstation.

364
Platformdevices
Onembeddedsystems,devicesareoftennotconnected throughabusallowingenumeration,hotplugging,and providinguniqueidentifiersfordevices. However,westillwantthedevicestobepartofthedevice model. Thesolutiontothisistheplatformdriver/platformdevice infrastructure. Theplatformdevicesarethedevicesthataredirectly connectedtotheCPU,withoutanykindofbus.
365
Implementationofaplatformdriver
Thedriverimplementsaplatform_driverstructure (exampletakenfromdrivers/serial/imx.c)
staticstructplatform_driverserial_imx_driver={ staticstructplatform_driverserial_imx_driver={ .probe=serial_imx_probe, .probe=serial_imx_probe, .remove=serial_imx_remove, .remove=serial_imx_remove, .driver={ .driver={ .name="imxuart", .name="imxuart", .owner=THIS_MODULE, .owner=THIS_MODULE, }, }, }; };
Andregistersitsdrivertotheplatformdriverinfrastructure
staticint__initimx_serial_init(void) staticint__initimx_serial_init(void) { { [...] [...] ret=platform_driver_register(&serial_imx_driver); ret=platform_driver_register(&serial_imx_driver); [...] [...] } }
366
Instantiationoftheplatformdevice(1)
Intheboardspecificcode,theplatformdevicesare instantiated(arch/arm/machimx/mx1ads.c):
staticstructplatform_deviceimx_uart1_device={ staticstructplatform_deviceimx_uart1_device={ .name="imxuart", .name="imxuart", .id=0, .id=0, .num_resources=ARRAY_SIZE(imx_uart1_resources), .num_resources=ARRAY_SIZE(imx_uart1_resources), .resource=imx_uart1_resources, .resource=imx_uart1_resources, .dev={ .dev={ .platform_data=&uart_pdata, .platform_data=&uart_pdata, } } }; };
Thematchbetweenthedeviceandthedriverismadeusing thename.Itmustbeuniqueamongstdrivers!
367
Instantiationoftheplatformdevice(2)
Thedeviceispartofalist
staticstructplatform_device*devices[]__initdata={ staticstructplatform_device*devices[]__initdata={ &cs89x0_device, &cs89x0_device, &imx_uart1_device, &imx_uart1_device, &imx_uart2_device, &imx_uart2_device, }; };
Andthelistofdevicesisaddedtothesystem duringboardinitialization
staticvoid__initmx1ads_init(void) staticvoid__initmx1ads_init(void) { { [...] [...] platform_add_devices(devices,ARRAY_SIZE(devices)); platform_add_devices(devices,ARRAY_SIZE(devices)); } }
368
I/OResources
EachplatformdeviceisassociatedwithasetofI/Oresources, referencedintheplatform_devicestructure
staticstructresourceimx_uart1_resources[]={ staticstructresourceimx_uart1_resources[]={ [0]={ [0]={ .start=0x00206000, .start=0x00206000, .end=0x002060FF, .end=0x002060FF, .flags=IORESOURCE_MEM, .flags=IORESOURCE_MEM, }, }, [1]={ [1]={ .start=(UART1_MINT_RX), .start=(UART1_MINT_RX), .end=(UART1_MINT_RX), .end=(UART1_MINT_RX), .flags=IORESOURCE_IRQ, .flags=IORESOURCE_IRQ, }, }, }; };
ItallowsthedrivertobeindependentfortheI/Oaddresses,IRQ numbers!Seeimx_uart2_deviceforanotherdeviceusingthe sameplatformdriver.

369
Insidetheplatformdriver
Whenaplatform_deviceisaddedtothesystemusing platform_add_device(),theprobe()methodofthe platformdrivergetscalled. Thismethodisresponsibleforinitializingthehardware, registeringthedevicetotheproperframework(inourcase, theserialdriverframework). TheplatformdriverhasaccesstotheI/Oresources:
res=platform_get_resource(pdev,IORESOURCE_MEM,0); res=platform_get_resource(pdev,IORESOURCE_MEM,0); base=ioremap(res>start,PAGE_SIZE); base=ioremap(res>start,PAGE_SIZE); sport>rxirq=platform_get_irq(pdev,0); sport>rxirq=platform_get_irq(pdev,0);
370
sysfstools
http://linuxdiag.sourceforge.net/Sysfsutils.html libsysfsThelibrary'spurposeistoprovideaconsistentand stableinterfaceforqueryingsystemdeviceinformationexposed throughsysfs.Usedbyudev(seelater). systoolAutilitybuiltuponlibsysfsthatlistsdevicesby bus,class,andtopology.
371
DeviceModelreferences
Kerneldocumentation Documentation/drivermodel/ Documentation/filesystems/sysfs.txt Linux2.6DeviceModel http://www.bravegnu.org/devicemodel/devicemodel.html LinuxDeviceDrivers,chapter14TheLinuxDevice Model http://lwn.net/images/pdf/LDD3/ch14.pdf Thekernelsourcecode Fullofexamplesofotherdrivers!
372
Driverdevelopment
udev,mdevandhotplug
373
/devissuesandlimitations
OnRedHat9,18000entriesin/dev! Allentriesforallpossibledevices hadtobecreatedatsysteminstallation. Neededanauthoritytoassignmajornumbers http://lanana.org/:LinuxAssignedNamesandNumbersAuthority Notenoughnumbersin2.4,limitsextendedin2.6. Userspaceneitherknewwhatdeviceswerepresentinthesystem, norwhichrealdevicecorrespondedtoeach/deventry.
374
devfssolutionandlimitations
devfs:afirstsolutionimplementedinLinux2.3. Onlyshowedpresentdevices. Butuseddifferentnamesasin/dev,causingissuesinscripts. Butnoflexibilityindevicenames,unlikewith/dev/,e.g.the1st IDEdiskdevicehadtobecalledeither/dev/hdaor /dev/ide/hd/c0b0t0u0. Butdidn'tallowdynamicmajorandminornumberallocation. Butrequiredtostorethedevicenamingpolicyinkernelmemory. KeptforeverinkernelRAMevenwhennolongerneeded. devfswascompletelyremovedinLinux2.6.18.
375
devtmpfs
Inmainlinestartingfrom2.6.32. Thebasicideaistocreateatmpfsearlyinthekernel initializationbeforethedrivercorehasinitialized. Aseachdeviceregisterswiththedrivercore,itsmajorand minornumbersanddevicenamecanbeusedtocreatean entryinthatfilesystem. Nouserspacesupport,usefulforembeddeddevice
376
Theudevsolution
TakesadvantageofsysfsintroducedbyLinux2.6. CreatedbyGregKroahHartman,ahugecontributor. Otherkeycontributors:KaySievers,DanStekloff. Entirelyinuserspace. Automaticallycreates/removesdeviceentries in/dev/accordingtoinserted/removeddevices. Majorandminordevicetransmittedbythekernel. Requiresnochangetodrivercode. Fast:writteninC Smallsize:udevdversion108:61KBinUbuntu7.04
377
Themdevsolution
mdevisanappletofbusybox. Samefeaturesofudev. Verysimpleconfigurationwithmdev.conf. Itcanstart/stopcommandsorscriptswhenadevicefileis created/removed.Forexampleanentryinthemdev.confcouldbe: mmc.*0:0777*(/usr/bin/automount_sdcard.sh) Wecanuse@,$,*beforethepathtostartthecommandwhenthedevice isconnected,whenit'sdisconnectedorboth,respectively.
378
udevandmdevresources
Homepage http://kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/udev.html Sources http://kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/kernel/hotplug/ Recentstateofudev,byKaySievers(verygoodarticle): http://vrfy.org/log/recentstateofudev.html Theudevmanualpage: manudev
mdevdocumentationinthebusyboxdocfolder
379
Adviceandresources
Gettinghelpandcontributions
380
Solvingissues
Ifyoufaceanissue,anditdoesn'tlookspecifictoyourworkbut rathertothetoolsyouareusing,itisverylikelythatsomeoneelse alreadyfacedit. SearchtheInternetforsimilarerrorreports. Youhavegreatchancesoffindingasolutionorworkaround,orat leastanexplanationforyourissue. Otherwise,reportingtheissueisuptoyou!
381
Gettinghelp
Ifyouhaveasupportcontract,askyourvendor. Otherwise,don'thesitatetoshareyourquestionsandissues EithercontacttheLinuxmailinglistforyourarchitecture(likelinuxarm kernelorlinuxshdev...). Orcontactthemailinglistforthesubsystemyou'redealingwith(linuxusb devel,linuxmtd...).Don'taskthemaintainerdirectly! MostmailinglistscomewithaFAQpage.Makesureyoureaditbefore contactingthemailinglist. UsefulIRCresourcesareavailabletoo (forexampleonhttp://kernelnewbies.org). RefrainfromcontactingtheLinuxKernelmailinglist,unlessyou'rean experienceddeveloperandneedadvice.
382
Gettingcontributions
Appliesifyourprojectcaninterestotherpeople: developingadriverorfilesystem,portingLinuxonanew processor,boardordeviceavailableonthemarket... Externalcontributorscanhelpyoualotby Testing. Writingdocumentation. Makingsuggestions. Evenwritingcode.
383
Encouragingcontributions
Openyourdevelopmentprocess:mailinglist,Wiki,publicCVS readaccess. Leteveryonecontributeaccordingtotheirskillsandinterests. Releaseearly,releaseoften. Takefeedbackandsuggestionsintoaccount. Recognizecontributions. Makesurestatusanddocumentationareuptodate. Publicizeyourworkandprogresstobroaderaudiences.
384
Adviceandresources
Bugreportandpatchsubmission
385
ReportingLinuxbugs
Firstmakesureyou'reusingthelatestversion. Makesureyouinvestigatetheissueasmuchasyoucan: seeDocumentation/BUG_HUNTING. Makesurethebughasnotbeenreportedyet.Abugtrackingsystem (http://bugzilla.kernel.org/)existsbutveryfewkerneldevelopersuseit. Besttousewebsearchengines(accessingpublicmailinglistarchives). Ifthesubsystemyoureportabugonhasamailinglist,useit. Otherwise,contacttheofficialmaintainer(seetheMANTAINERSfile). Alwaysgiveasmanyusefuldetailsaspossible.
386
Howtosubmitpatchesordrivers
Don'tmergepatchesaddressingdifferentissues. Youshouldidentifyandcontacttheofficialmaintainer forthefilestopatch. SeeDocumentation/SubmittingPatchesfordetails.Fortrivial patches,youcancopytheTrivialPatchMonkey. Seealsohttp://kernelnewbies.org/UpstreamMergeforveryhelpfuladviceto haveyourcodemergedupstream(byRikvanRiel). Specialsubsystems: ARMplatform:it'sbesttosubmityourARMpatchestoRussellKing's patchsystem:http://www.arm.linux.org.uk/developer/patches/
387
Howtobecomeakerneldeveloper?
GregKroahHartmanwroteusefulguidelinesinthekerneldocumentation:
Documentation/HOWTO.
HowtoParticipateintheLinuxCommunity(byJonathanCorbet) AGuideToTheKernelDevelopmentProcess
http://ldn.linuxfoundation.org/documentation/howparticipatelinuxcommunity
Readthislastdocumentfirst. Itisprobablysufficient!
388
Adviceandresources
References
389
Informationsites(1)
LinuxWeeklyNews http://lwn.net/ TheweeklydigestoffallLinuxandfreesoftware informationsources. Indepthtechnicaldiscussionsaboutthekernel. Subscribetofinancetheeditors($5/month). Articlesavailablefornonsubscribers after1week.
390
Informationsites(2)
KernelTrap http://kerneltrap.org/ Forumwebsiteforkerneldevelopers. News,articles,whitepapers,discussions,polls,interviews. Perfectifadigestisnotenough!
391
Usefulreading(1)
LinuxDeviceDrivers,3rd edition,Feb2005 ByJonathanCorbet,AlessandroRubini, GregKroahHartman,O'Reilly http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/linuxdrive3/ Freelyavailableonline! Greatcompaniontotheprintedbook foreasyelectronicsearches! http://lwn.net/Kernel/LDD3/(1PDFfileperchapter) http://freeelectrons.com/community/kernel/ldd3/(singlePDFfile) AmusthavebookforLinuxdevicedriverwriters!
392
Usefulreading(2)
LinuxKernelinaNutshell,Dec2006 ByGregKroahHartman,O'Reilly http://www.kroah.com/lkn/ Agoodreferencebookandguideonconfiguring, compilingandmanagingtheLinuxkernelsources. Freelyavailableonline! Greatcompaniontotheprintedbook foreasyelectronicsearches! AvailableassinglePDFfileon http://freeelectrons.com/community/kernel/lkn/
393
Usefulreading(3)
LinuxKernelDevelopment,2nd Edition,Jan2005 RobertLove,NovellPress http://freeelectrons.com/redirect/lkd2book.html Averysyntheticandpleasantwaytolearnaboutkernel subsystems(beyondtheneedsofdevicedriverwriters) UnderstandingtheLinuxKernel,3rd edition,Nov2005 DanielP.Bovet,MarcoCesati,O'Reilly http://oreilly.com/catalog/understandlk/ AnextensivereviewofLinuxkernelinternals, coveringLinux2.6atlast. Unfortunately,onlycoversthePCarchitecture.
394
Usefulonlineresources
LinuxkernelmailinglistFAQ http://www.tux.org/lkml/ CompleteLinuxkernelFAQ Readthisbeforeaskingaquestiontothemailinglist KernelNewbies http://kernelnewbies.org/ Glossary,articles,presentations,HOWTOs, recommendedreading,usefultoolsforpeople gettingfamiliarwithLinuxkernelordriverdevelopment. Kernelglossary: http://kernelnewbies.org/KernelGlossary
395
EmbeddedLinuxWiki
TheembeddedLinuxWikicontainsloadsofusefulresources forembeddedsystemsdevelopers: ManyHOWTOdocumentsofallkinds,coveringtopicslikesystem size,boottime,multimedia,powermanagement,toolchains... Kernelpatchesnotavailableinmainstreamyet(e.g.LinuxTiny). Communityresource:hackerinterviews,bookreviews, eventcoverage... Isopentoeveryone.Contributionsarewelcome! http://elinux.org
396
ARMresources
ARMLinuxproject:http://www.arm.linux.org.uk/ Developerdocumentation:http://www.arm.linux.org.uk/developer/ armlinuxkernelmailinglist: http://lists.arm.linux.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/linuxarmkernel FAQ:http://www.arm.linux.org.uk/armlinux/mlfaq.php Howtopostkernelfixes: http://www.arm.uk.linux.org/developer/patches/ ARMLinux@Simtec:http://armlinux.simtec.co.uk/ Afewusefulresources:FAQ,documentationandWho'swho! ARMLimited:http://www.linuxarm.com/ Wikiwithlinkstousefuldeveloperresources
397
Internationalconferences(1)
UsefulconferencesfeaturingLinuxkernelpresentations OttawaLinuxSymposium(July):http://linuxsymposium.org/ Lotsofkerneltopicsbymajorkernelhackers. Freelyavailableproceedings. Fosdem:http://fosdem.org(Brussels,February) Fordevelopers.Kernelpresentationsfromwellknownkernelhackers. EmbeddedLinuxConference:http://embeddedlinuxconference.com/ OrganizedbytheCELinuxForum:California (SanJose,April),inEurope(November).Frequenttechnicalsessions inJapan.Veryinterestingkerneltopicsforembeddedsystems developers.Presentationslidesfreelyavailable.
398
Internationalconferences(2)
linux.conf.au:http://conf.linux.org.au/(Australia/NewZealand) Featuresafewpresentationsbykeykernelhackers.
399
Annexes
Kernelsources
400
Checkingtheintegrityofsources
KernelsourceintegritycanbecheckedthroughOpenPGPdigitalsignatures. Fulldetailsonhttp://www.kernel.org/signature.html DetailsaboutGnuPG:http://www.gnupg.org/gph/en/manual.html ImportthepublicGnuPGkeyofkerneldevelopers:
gpgkeyserverpgp.mit.edurecvkeys0x517D0F0E
Ifblockedbyyourfirewall,lookfor0x517D0F0Eonhttp://pgp.mit.edu/, copyandpastethekeytoalinuxkey.txtfile: gpgimportlinuxkey.txt Downloadthesignaturefilecorrespondingtoyourkernelversion (atthesamelocation),andrunthesignaturecheck: gpgverifylinux2.6.11.12.tar.bz2.sign
401
Annexes
Slabcachesandmemorypools
402
Slabcaches
Alsocalledlookasidecaches Slabcaches:Objectsthatcanholdanynumber ofmemoryareasofthesamesize. OptimumuseofavailableRAMandreducedfragmentation. MainlyusedinLinuxcoresubsystems:filesystems(openfiles,inode andfilecaches...),networking...Livestatson/proc/slabinfo. Maybeusefulindevicedriverstoo,thoughnotusedsooften. Linux2.6:usedbyUSBandSCSIdrivers.
403
SlabcacheAPI(1)
#include<linux/slab.h> Creatingacache: cache=kmem_cache_create( name, /*Namefor/proc/slabinfo*/ size, /*Cacheobjectsize*/ align, /*Cachealignment*/ flags, /*Options:DMA,debugging,tracing...*/ constructor, /*Optional,calledaftereachallocation*/ destructor); /*Optional,calledbeforeeachrelease*/ Example:drivers/usb/host/uhcihcd.c uhci_up_cachep=kmem_cache_create( "uhci_urb_priv",sizeof(structurb_priv), 0,0,NULL,NULL);
404
SlabcacheAPI(2)
SinceLinux2.6.22,amacrocansimplifycachecreationinmostcases: #defineKMEM_CACHE(__struct,__flags)\ kmem_cache_create(#__struct,\ sizeof(struct__struct),\ __alignof__(struct__struct),\ (__flags),NULL,NULL) Example:kernel/pid.c pid_cachep=KMEM_CACHE(pid,SLAB_PANIC);
405
SlabcacheAPI(3)
Allocatingfromthecache: object=kmem_cache_alloc(cache,flags); orobject=kmem_cache_zalloc(cache,flags); Freeinganobject: kmem_cache_free(cache,object); Destroyingthewholecache: kmem_cache_destroy(cache); MoredetailsandanexampleintheLinuxDeviceDriversbook: http://lwn.net/images/pdf/LDD3/ch08.pdf
406
Memorypools
Usefulformemoryallocationsthatcannotfail Kindoflookasidecachetryingtokeepaminimumnumber ofpreallocatedobjectsaheadoftime. Usewithcare:otherwisecanresultinalotofunused memorythatcannotbereclaimed!Useothersolutions wheneverpossible.
407
MemorypoolAPI(1)
#include<linux/mempool.h> Mempoolcreation: mempool=mempool_create( min_nr, alloc_function, free_function, pool_data);
408
MemorypoolAPI(2)
Allocatingobjects: object=mempool_alloc(pool,flags); Freeingobjects: mempool_free(object,pool); Resizingthepool: status=mempool_resize( pool,new_min_nr,flags); Destroyingthepool(caution:freeallobjectsfirst!): mempool_destroy(pool);
409
Memorypoolimplementation
mempool_create mempool_create Callalloc functionmin_nr times
mempool_alloc mempool_alloc
Callalloc Callalloc function function
No Success? Success? Yes
Takean Takean objectfrom objectfrom thepool thepool
mempool_free mempool_free
poolcount poolcount <min_nr? <min_nr? No Callfree Callfree function function onobject onobject
Yes
Addfreed Addfreed objecttopool objecttopool
Newobject Newobject
410
Memorypoolsusingslabcaches
Idea:useslabcachefunctionstoallocateandfreeobjects. Themempool_alloc_slabandmempool_free_slabfunctions supplyalinkwithslabcacheroutines. So,youwillfindmanycodeexampleslookinglike: cache=kmem_cache_create(...); pool=mempool_create( min_nr, mempool_alloc_slab, mempool_free_slab, cache); There'sashorthandpoolcreationfunctionforthiscase: pool=mempool_create_slab_pool(min_nr,cache);
411
Annexes
Ubootdetails
412
PostprocessingkernelimageforUboot
TheUbootbootloaderneedsextrainformationtobeaddedto thekernelandinitrdimagefiles. mkimagepostprocessingutilityprovidedinUbootsources Kernelimagepostprocessing: makeuImage
413
PostprocessinginitrdimageforUboot
mkimage ninitrd\ Aarm\ Olinux\ Tramdisk\ Cgzip\ drdext2.gz\ uInitrd Name Architecture OperatingSystem Type Compression Inputfile Outputfile
414
CompilingDasUboot
GettheUbootsourcesfromhttp://www.denx.de/wiki/UBoot IntheUbootsourcedirectory: Findthenameoftheconfigfileforyourboardininclude/configs (forexample:omap1710h3.h) ConfigureUboot: makeomap1710h3_config(.hreplacedby_config) Ifneeded,changethecrosscompilerprefixinMakefile: ifeq($(ARCH),arm) CROSS_COMPILE=armlinux endif Compile: make
415
CompilingUbootmkimage
IfyoujustneedmkimageandUbootisalreadyinstalledonyourboard: mkimageiscompletelyarchitectureandboardindependent. ConfigureUbootsourcesforanyboardonanyarchitecture (seepreviousslide). Compile: make(ormakekifyouhaveminorfailures) Installmkimage: cptools/mkimage/usr/local/bin/
416
Ubootprompt
Connectthetargettothehostthroughaserialconsole. Poweruptheboard. Ontheserialconsole,youwillseesomethinglike: UBoot1.3.4(Dec4200817:31:20) RAMConfiguration: Bank#0:000000008MB Flash:2MB In:serial Out:serial Err:serial uboot#
417
Boardinformation
uboot#bdinfo DRAMbank=0x00000000 >start=0x00000000 >size=0x00800000 ethaddr=00:40:95:36:35:33 ip_addr=10.0.0.11 baudrate=19200bps
418
Environmentvariables(1)
uboot#printenv baudrate=19200 ethaddr=00:40:95:36:35:33 netmask=255.255.255.0 ipaddr=10.0.0.11 serverip=10.0.0.1 stdin=serial stdout=serial stderr=serial uboot#printenvserverip serverip=10.0.0.2
Networksettings ForTFTP andNFS
uboot#setenvserverip10.0.0.2
419
Environmentvariables(2)
Environmentvariablechangescanbestored toflashusingthesaveenvcommand. Youcanevencreatesmallshellscripts storedinenvironmentvariables: setenvmyscript'tftp0x21400000uImage; bootm0x21400000' Youcanthenexecutethescript: runmyscript
Moreelaboratescriptingisavailablewithscriptfiles, tobeprocessedwithmkimage.
420
Networkcommands
uboot#tftp8000uboot.bin Fromserver10.0.0.1;ourIPaddressis 10.0.0.11 Filename'uboot.bin'. Loadaddress:0x8000 Loading:################### done Bytestransferred=95032(17338hex) Theaddressandsizeofthedownloadedfilearestoredinthe fileaddrandfilesizeenvironmentvariables.
421
Flashcommands(1)
uboot#flinfo Bank#1:AMDAm29LV160DB16KB,2x8KB,32KB,31x64KB Size:2048KBin35Sectors SectorStartAddresses: S00@0x01000000!S01@0x01004000! S02@0x01006000!S03@0x01008000! S04@0x01010000!S05@0x01020000! S06@0x01030000S07@0x01040000 Protectedsectors ... S32@0x011D0000S33@0x011E0000 S34@0x011F0000
422
Flashcommands(2)
uboot#protectoff1:04 UnProtectFlashSectors04inBank#1 uboot#erase1:04 EraseFlashSectors04inBank#1 ErasingSector0@0x01000000...done ErasingSector1@0x01004000...done ErasingSector2@0x01006000...done ErasingSector3@0x01008000...done ErasingSector4@0x01010000...done
423
Flashcommands(3)
Storingafileinflash Downloadingfromthenetwork: uboot#tftp8000uboot.bin Copytoflash(0x01000000:firstsector) uboot#cp.b${fileaddr}1000000${filesize} CopytoFlash...................done Restoreflashsectorprotection: uboot#protecton1:04 ProtectFlashSectors05inBank#1
424
bootcommands
Specifykernelbootparameters: Continueson uboot#setenvbootargsmem=64M\ thesameline console=ttyS0,115200init=/sbin/init\ root=/dev/mtdblock0 Executethekernelfromagivenphysicaladdress(RAMorflash): bootm0x01030000
425
Usefullinks
Uboothomepage: http://www.denx.de/wiki/UBoot/WebHome VeryniceoverviewaboutUboot (whichhelpedtocreatethissection): http://linuxdevices.com/articles/AT5085702347.html TheUbootmanual: http://www.denx.de/wiki/view/DULG/UBoot
426
Annexes
Initrunlevels
427
SystemVinitrunlevels(1)
IntroducedbySystemVUnix MuchmoreflexiblethaninBSD Makeitpossibletostartorstop differentservicesforeach runlevel Correspondtotheargumentgiven to/sbin/init. Runlevelsdefinedin /etc/inittab.
/etc/initabexcerpt: /etc/initabexcerpt:
id:5:initdefault: id:5:initdefault: #Systeminitialization. #Systeminitialization. si::sysinit:/etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit si::sysinit:/etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit l0:0:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc0 l0:0:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc0 l1:1:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc1 l1:1:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc1 l2:2:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc2 l2:2:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc2 l3:3:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc3 l3:3:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc3 l4:4:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc4 l4:4:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc4 l5:5:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc5 l5:5:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc5 l6:6:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc6 l6:6:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc6
428
SystemVinitrunlevels(2)
Standardlevels init0 Haltthesystem init1 Singleusermodeformaintenance init6 Rebootthesystem initS Singleusermodeformaintenance. Mountingonly/.Oftenidenticalto1 Customizablelevels:2,3,4,5 init3 Oftenmultiusermode,withonly commandlinelogin init5 Oftenmultiusermode,with graphicallogin
429
initscripts
Accordingto/etc/inittabsettings,init<n>runs: First/etc/rc.d/rc.sysinitforallrunlevels Thenscriptsin/etc/rc<n>.d/ Startingservices(1,3,5,S): runsS*scriptswiththestartoption Killingservices(0,6): runsK*scriptswiththestopoption Scriptsareruninfilenamelexicalorder Justuselsltofindouttheorder!
430
/etc/init.d
Repositoryforallavailableinitscripts /etc/rc<n>.d/onlycontainslinkstothe/etc/init.d/ scriptsneededforrunleveln /etc/rc1.d/example(fromFedoraCore3) K01yum>../init.d/yum K02atd>../init/atd K05anacron>../init.d/anacron S00single>../init.d/single S01sysstat>../init.d/sysstat S06cpuspeed>../init.d/cpuspeed
431
Handlinginitscriptsbyhand
Simplycallthe/etc/init.dscripts! sudo/etc/init.d/sshdstart Startingsshd:[OK] sudo/etc/init.d/nfsstop ShuttingdownNFSmountd:[FAILED] ShuttingdownNFSdaemon:[FAILED] ShuttingdownNFSquotas:[FAILED] ShuttingdownNFSservices:[OK] sudo/etc/init.d/pcmciastatus cardmgr(pid3721)isrunning... sudo/etc/init.d/httpdrestart Stoppinghttpd:[OK] Startinghttpd:[OK]
432
Annexes
EmbeddedDistributionsandTools
433
ELDK
EmbeddedLinuxDevelopmentkitprovidedbyDENX. providesacompleteandpowerfulsoftwaredevelopment environmentforembeddedandrealtimesystems. ItisavailableforARM,PowerPCandMIPSprocessorsand consistsof:
CrossDevelopmentTools(Compiler,Assembler,Linkeretc.). NativeTools(Shell,commandsandlibraries). Firmware(UBoot). Linuxkernel. XenomaiRTOSEmulationframeworkforsystemsrequiringhardrealtime responses. SELF(SimpleEmbeddedLinuxFramework)tobuildyourembeddedsystemson.
434
Buildroot
Buildrootisacompletebuildingsystem:toolchain,firmware, kernelandrootfilesystem. Hugenumberofpackageswhichcanbecompiledintothe image. Itisausefultoolevenonlytogenerateanewtoolchain. ItshouldbenotedhoweverthatitonlysupportsuClibc! Graphicmenulikemenuconfigofthekernel.
435
Crosstool
Scriptwhichdownloadssourcetarballsandbuildssimple gcc/glibccrosstoolchains. Buildmatrixwhichshowswhichversionsofgcc/glibcwork togetherwithvariousarchitectures. It'seasytoselectwhichversionsofgcc/glibcshouldbeused togenerateatoolchainforaparticulararchitecture.
436
CrosstoolNG
Forkofcrosstool. Easierconfiguration,refactoredcode,andalearningbaseon howtoolchainsarebuilt. SupportbothuClibcandglibc,debugtools(gdb,strace, dmalloc...),andawiderangeofversionsforeachtools.
437
Busybox
Implementationofhundredsofunix/linuxcommandsina singleexecutable. AmustintheLinuxembeddedworld. Designedtobesizecritical. Wecouldbuildacompleterootfilesystemonlywithit! Oneexecutableandseverallinks. Securitysettingsforeachappletcanbeconfiguredatrun timeinthebusybox.conffile. SeeBusyboxHomepage
438
Annexes
EmbeddedFilesystems
439
Mostimportantembeddedfilesystems
CRAMFSCompressedROMfilesystem SQUASHFS AXFSAdvancedXIPFileSystem JFFS2JournallingFlashFileSystem YAFFS2YetAnotherFlashFileSystem UBIFSUnsortedBlockImagesFileSystem LogFSLogstructuredFilesystem PRAMFSPersistentandProtectedRAMFilesystem
ReadOnly
440
CRAMFS
Filesysteminmainline. Metadatanotcompressed. Filesizesarelimitedtolessthan16MBandmaxfilesystem sizeisalittleover256MB. Notimestampsarestoredinacramfs. Doesn'tsupport16/32bitsuid/gid.
441
SquashFS
Itisinmainlinestartingfrom2.6.29. Data,inodesanddirectoriesarecompressed. Itstoresfulluid/gids(32bits),andfilecreationtime. Filesupto2^64bytesandfilesystemscanbeupto2^64 bytes. Inodeanddirectorydataarehighlycompacted. Fileduplicatesaredetectedandremoved. Bothbigandlittleendianarchitecturesaresupported. Onlyforblockdevicebutreadonlysoit'sfinetouse mtdblockdriver
442
AXFS
DesignedspecificallytosupportExecuteinplaceoperations. Biphasedapproach:
Firstphase:filesysteminflashandrunittocollectprofiledata, statingwhatpagesareused. Secondphase:buildafilesystemusingtheseprofiledata.All pagesmentionedintheprofilefileasXIPdata.
CompressedregionsplusXIPregionsapproach. It'spossibleasplitacrossXIPNORandnonXIPNAND.
443
JFFS2/YAFFS2
JFFS2 YAFFS2
Wearleveling,ECC Powerdownresistant Ontheflycompression Hugemounttimes MetadatainRAM Mainline
SpecificforNANDdevice (butitworksevenwithNOR) Wearleveling,ECC Powerdownresistant Nocompression Veryquickmounttime AvailableasaLinuxpatch
444
UBIFS
UBIFSinmainlinestartingfrom2.6.27. VolumemanagementsystemontopofMTDdevices. Allowstocreatemultiplelogicalvolumesandspreadwritesacross allphysicalblocks. Takescareofmanagingtheeraseblocksandwearleveling. Separationbetweenlogicaleraseblock(UBI),groupedbyvolumes andphysicaleraseblock(MTD). BestperformancecomparedtoJFFS2andYAFFS2... Seehttp://freeelectrons.com/pub/conferences/2008/elce/flashfilesystems.pdf ....butithasgotsomeperformanceissueduetobadblocktable builtoneachmount.
445
LogFS
Inmainlinestartingfrom2.6.34. UnlikeJFFS2,LogFSstorestreeinformationonflashinstead ofreadingthemediumatmounttime,readingitinO(1). Thedeviceistreatedlikeasortofcircularbuffer,withnew dataalwaysbeingwrittentotheendlikealog. Itimplementsthe"wanderingtree"algorithm:changesatthe bottomofthefstreewillpropagateupwardallthewaytothe root.Oneoftheadvantagesisthattheoldfilesystem structureremainsvaliduntiltherootisrewritten. Itusesafixedlocationdatainthemediumwhereversioned pointerstotherootinodecanbefoundcalledanchorarea.
LogFSinfo:http://lazybastard.org/~joern/logfs1.pdf
446
PRAMFS
FSlivesonlyinRAM. Itisdesignedtoberesistanttosystemshutdown(forexample withanSRAMbatterybacked)orsystemreboot. UseDirectIOtoavoidpagecaching. Filedimensionupto2^30. Itusehardwareprotection(MMU)toavoidcorruptionofthefs againstkernelbugs. ItsupportsXIPfeature. Itstoresfulluid/gids(32bits),andfilecreationtime. Betterperformancescomparedwithdiskfs(ext2/3/4)overram.
447
Legalstatements
LinuxisaregisteredtrademarkofLinusTorvalds. LinuxlogobasedonoriginallogobyLarryEwing. Othercompany,product,andservicenamesmaybe trademarksorservicemarksofothers.
448

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EmbeddedLinuxkernelanddriverdevelopment Copyright20092010,MarcoStornelli CreativeCommonsAttributionShareAlike3.0license Mar20,2010

EmbeddedLinuxkernelanddriverdevelopment Copyright20092010,MarcoStornelli CreativeCommonsAttributionShareAlike3.0license Mar20,2010

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Notneededinembeddedsystemswithnoharddisks (dataaccesstimeindependentoflocationonflashstorage) BuildyourkernelwithnoopI/Oschedulerthen!

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Note:inreality,manymoreminor versionsexistinsidethestableand developmentbranches

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TheofficiallistofchangesforeachLinuxreleaseisjusta hugelistofindividualpatches! Verydifficulttofindoutthekeychangesandtogetthe globalpictureoutofindividualchanges.

Foreachnewkernelrelease,youcanalsogetthe changesinthekernelinternalAPI: http://lwn.net/Articles/2.6kernelapi/ What'snext? Documentation/featureremovalschedule.txt liststhefeatures,subsystemsandAPIsthatare plannedforremoval(announced1yearinadvance).

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Binary Binary blob blob (proprietary (proprietary driver) driver)

Theproprietaryblobisnotbrokenwhenyourecompileorupdatethe kerneland/ordriver.Hence,theproprietarydrivermaynotbeconsideredas aderivativework.However,thekernelismonolithicandtheblobstill belongstoasingleexecutable.Thisisstillcontroversial!

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Mounting/proc: sudomounttprocnone/proc Mounting/sys: sudomounttsysfsnone/sys

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Downloadkernel sourcesfrom http://kernel.org

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Youcanreverse Youcanreverse apatch apatch withtheR withtheR option option

Youcantestapatchwith Youcantestapatchwith thedryrun thedryrun option option

Keeppatchfilescompressed:usefultochecktheirsignaturelater. Youcanstillview(orevenedit)theuncompresseddatawithvi: vipatch2.6.11.bz2(onthefly(un)compression)

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