[PATCH] mfd: syscon: Decouple syscon interface from syscon devices

[Lee Jones]

On Mon, 01 Sep 2014, Arnd Bergmann wrote:

> On Monday 01 September 2014 17:04:26 Lee Jones wrote:
> > On Mon, 01 Sep 2014, Arnd Bergmann wrote:
> > > Maybe I'm misreading the patch, but I don't see how it creates a
> > > migration path. What I want to end up with is infrastructure that
> > > lets anybody call syscon_regmap_lookup_by_pdevname or
> > > syscon_regmap_lookup_by_compatible (if they really need to)
> > > without needing the platform_driver for syscon. That should not
> > > require any form of compatibility layer because to the driver
> > > using it there is no API change.
> > 
> > Somehow I think the likelyhood is that I am misreading the patch.
> > 
> > I thought that before this patch drivers we had to register a syscon
> > device to bind to this driver, which was fine for the first use-cases
> > of syscon as it wasn't required too early during boot.  However, now
> > there are use-cases where systems require access to syscon registers
> > eariler in boot we require a means to obtain access prior to device
> > probing.  I thought this patch not only provides that possibilty, but
> > also leaves in the ability to register direct from DT.
> 
> Right, it does provide the ability to have syscon before devices
> are registered, I missed that part.
> 
> > > In contrast, this patch introduces a new of_syscon_{un,}register()
> > > interface that would get removed after the the above has
> > > been implemented, causing extra churn for any driver that also
> > > wants to provide a regmap-like interface.
> > 
> > When will we ever not have to register syscon?
> 
> The idea is that we implicitly register the syscon block when someone
> calls syscon_regmap_lookup_by_compatible or syscon_regmap_lookup_by_phandle
> and then return a reference to that new syscon. When another driver
> looks up the same device node, we just pass a reference to the existing
> syscon.

Doesn't sound too unreasonable.  So how about instead of exporting
these new of_syscon_{un,}register() calls, we make them static and
call them from syscon_regmap_lookup_by_{phandle,compatible}?

-- 
Lee Jones
Linaro STMicroelectronics Landing Team Lead
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