[linux-sunxi] Re: [PATCH v3] dt-bindings: Add a clocks property to the simple-framebuffer binding

[Hans de Goede]

Hi,

On 10/04/2014 02:38 PM, jonsmirl at gmail.com wrote:
> On Sat, Oct 4, 2014 at 5:50 AM, Hans de Goede <hdegoede at redhat.com> wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> On 10/04/2014 12:56 AM, jonsmirl at gmail.com wrote:
>>> On Fri, Oct 3, 2014 at 4:08 PM, Rob Herring <robherring2 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> On Fri, Oct 3, 2014 at 12:34 PM, Hans de Goede <hdegoede at redhat.com> wrote:
>>>>> Hi,
>>>>>
>>>>> On 10/03/2014 05:57 PM, Rob Herring wrote:
>>>>>> On Fri, Oct 3, 2014 at 9:05 AM, Hans de Goede <hdegoede at redhat.com> wrote:
>>>>>>> A simple-framebuffer node represents a framebuffer setup by the firmware /
>>>>>>> bootloader. Such a framebuffer may have a number of clocks in use, add a
>>>>>>> property to communicate this to the OS.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Signed-off-by: Hans de Goede <hdegoede at redhat.com>
>>>>>>> Reviewed-by: Mike Turquette <mturquette at linaro.org>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> --
>>>>>>> Changes in v2:
>>>>>>> -Added Reviewed-by: Mike Turquette <mturquette at linaro.org>
>>>>>>> Changes in v3:
>>>>>>> -Updated description to make clear simplefb deals with more then just memory
>>>>>>
>>>>>> NAK. "Fixing" the description is not what I meant and does not address
>>>>>> my concerns. Currently, simplefb is configuration data. It is
>>>>>> auxiliary data about how a chunk of memory is used. Using it or not
>>>>>> has no side effects on the hardware setup, but you are changing that
>>>>>> aspect. You are mixing in a hardware description that is simply
>>>>>> inaccurate.
>>>>>
>>>>> Memory is hardware too, what simplefb is is best seen as a virtual device, and
>>>>> even virtual devices have hardware resources they need, such as a chunk of memory,
>>>>> which the kernel should not touch other then use it as a framebuffer, likewise
>>>>> on some systems the virtual device needs clocks to keep running.
>>>>>
>>>>>> The kernel has made the decision to turn off "unused" clocks. If its
>>>>>> determination of what is unused is wrong, then it is not a problem to
>>>>>> fix in DT.
>>>>>
>>>>> No, it is up to DT to tell the kernel what clocks are used, that is how it works
>>>>> for any other device. I don't understand why some people keep insisting simplefb
>>>>> for some reason is o so very very special, because it is not special, it needs
>>>>> resources, and it needs to tell the kernel about this or bad things happen.
>>>>
>>>> No, the DT describes the connections of clocks from h/w block to h/w
>>>> block. Their use is implied by the connection.
>>>>
>>>> And yes, as the other thread mentioned DT is more than just hardware
>>>> information. However, what you are adding IS hardware information and
>>>> clearly has a place somewhere else. And adding anything which is not
>>>> hardware description gets much more scrutiny.
>>>>
>>>>> More over it is a bit late to start making objections now. This has already been
>>>>> discussed to death for weeks now, and every argument against this patch has already
>>>>> been countered multiple times (including the one you are making now). Feel free to
>>>>> read the entire thread in the archives under the subject:
>>>>> "[PATCH 4/4] simplefb: add clock handling code"
>>>>
>>>> You are on v2 and I hardly see any consensus on the v1 thread. Others
>>>> have made suggestions which I would agree with and you've basically
>>>> ignored them.
>>>>
>>>>> At one point in time we need to stop bickering and make a decision, that time has
>>>>> come now, so please lets get this discussion over with and merge this, so that
>>>>> we can all move on and spend out time in a more productive manner.
>>>>
>>>> Not an effective argument to get things merged.
>>>
>>> If there is not good solution to deferring clock clean up in the
>>> kernel, another approach is to change how simple-framebuffer is
>>> described in the device tree....
>>>
>>> Right now it is a stand-alone item that looks like a device node, but
>>> it isn't a device.
>>>
>>> framebuffer {
>>>     compatible = "simple-framebuffer";
>>>     reg = <0x1d385000 (1600 * 1200 * 2)>;
>>>     width = <1600>;
>>>     height = <1200>;
>>>     stride = <(1600 * 2)>;
>>>     format = "r5g6b5";
>>> };
>>>
>>> How about something like this?
>>>
>>> reserved-memory {
>>>     #address-cells = <1>;
>>>     #size-cells = <1>;
>>>     ranges;
>>>
>>>     display_reserved: framebuffer at 78000000 {
>>>         reg = <0x78000000  (1600 * 1200 * 2)>;
>>>     };
>>> };
>>>
>>> lcd0: lcd-controller at 820000 {
>>>     compatible = "marvell,dove-lcd";
>>>     reg = <0x820000 0x1000>;
>>>     interrupts = <47>;
>>>     clocks = <&si5351 0>;
>>>     clock-names = "ext_ref_clk_1";
>>> };
>>>
>>> chosen {
>>>     boot-framebuffer {
>>>        compatible = "simple-framebuffer";
>>>        device = <&lcd0>;
>>>        framebuffer = <&display_reserved>;
>>>        width = <1600>;
>>>        height = <1200>;
>>>        stride = <(1600 * 2)>;
>>>        format = "r5g6b5";
>>>     };
>>> }
>>>
>>>
>>> This moves the definition of the boot framebuffer setup into the area
>>> where bootloader info is suppose to go. Then you can use the phandle
>>> to follow the actual device chains and protect the clocks and
>>> regulators. To make that work you are required to provide an accurate
>>> description of the real video hardware so that this chain can be
>>> followed.
>>
>> This will not work, first of all multiple blocks may be involved, so
>> the device = in the boot-framebuffer would need to be a list. That in
>> itself is not a problem, the problem is that the blocks used may have
>> multiple clocks, of which the setup mode likely uses only a few.
>>
>> So if we do things this way, we end up keeping way to many clocks
>> enabled.
> 
> That doesn't hurt anything.

<snip lots of stuff based on the above>

Wrong, that does hurt things. As already discussed simply stopping the
clocks from being disabled by the unused_clks mechanism is not enough,
since clocks may be shared, and we must stop another device driver
sharing the clock and doing clk_enable; probe; clk_disable; disabling
the shared clk, which means calling clk_enable on it to mark it as
being in use. So this will hurt cause it will cause us to enable a bunch
of clks which should not be enabled.

I've been thinking more about this, and I understand that people don't
want to put hardware description in the simplefb node, but this is
not hardware description.

u-boot sets up the display-pipeline to scan out of a certain part of
memory, in order to do this it writes the memory address to some registers
in the display pipeline, so what it is passing is not hardware description
(it is not passing all possible memory addresses for the framebuffer), but
it is passing information about the state in which it has left the display
pipeline, iow it is passing state information.

Likewise when u-boot sets up the display-pipeline it choices certain
clocks to use, just like it chooses a framebuffer address, and then
it programs those clocks into registers. So what we want to pass along
here is information about the way in which the display-pipeline has
been configured, so we're passing along state information,
not hardware description, just like with the framebuffer address.

Regards,

Hans