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From: Linus Walleij <linus.walleij@linaro.org>
To: Lee Jones <lee@kernel.org>, Pavel Machek <pavel@ucw.cz>
Cc: linux-leds@vger.kernel.org,
	Linus Walleij <linus.walleij@linaro.org>,
	Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de>, Tony Lindgren <tony@atomide.com>,
	Felipe Balbi <balbi@kernel.org>,
	linux-omap@vger.kernel.org, linux-gpio@vger.kernel.org
Subject: [PATCH v2] leds: Mark GPIO LED trigger broken
Date: Tue, 14 Mar 2023 22:00:59 +0100	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <20230314210059.419159-1-linus.walleij@linaro.org> (raw)

The GPIO LED trigger exposes a userspace ABI where a user
can echo a GPIO number from the global GPIO numberspace into
a file that will trigger a certain LED when active.

This is problematic because the global GPIO numberspace is
inherently instable. The trigger came about at a time when
systems had one GPIO controller that defined hard-wired
GPIOs numbered 0..N and this number space was stable.

We have since moved to dynamic allocation of GPIO numbers
and there is no real guarantee that a GPIO number will stay
consistent even across a reboot: consider a USB attached
GPIO controller for example. Or two. Or the effect of
probe order after adding -EPROBE_DEFER to the kernel.

The trigger was added to support keypad LEDs on the Nokia
n810 from the GPIO event when a user slides up/down the
keypad. This is arch/arm/boot/dts/omap2420-n810.dts.
A userspace script is needed to activate the trigger.
This will be broken unless the script was updated recently
since the OMAP GPIO controller now uses dynamic GPIO
number allocations.

I want to know that this trigger has active users that
cannot live without it if we are to continue to support it.

Option if this is really needed: I can develop a new trigger
that can associate GPIOs with LEDs as triggers using device
tree, which should also remove the use of userspace custom
scripts to achieve this and be much more trustworthy, if
someone with the Nokia n810 or a device with a similar need
is willing to test it.

Cc: Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de>
Cc: Tony Lindgren <tony@atomide.com>
Cc: Felipe Balbi <balbi@kernel.org>
Cc: linux-omap@vger.kernel.org
Cc: linux-gpio@vger.kernel.org

Signed-off-by: Linus Walleij <linus.walleij@linaro.org>
---
ChangeLog v1->v2:
- Be less intrusive and just mark the feature broken
  for now.
---
 drivers/leds/trigger/Kconfig | 1 +
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+)

diff --git a/drivers/leds/trigger/Kconfig b/drivers/leds/trigger/Kconfig
index dc6816d36d06..2a57328eca20 100644
--- a/drivers/leds/trigger/Kconfig
+++ b/drivers/leds/trigger/Kconfig
@@ -83,6 +83,7 @@ config LEDS_TRIGGER_ACTIVITY
 config LEDS_TRIGGER_GPIO
 	tristate "LED GPIO Trigger"
 	depends on GPIOLIB || COMPILE_TEST
+	depends on BROKEN
 	help
 	  This allows LEDs to be controlled by gpio events. It's good
 	  when using gpios as switches and triggering the needed LEDs
-- 
2.34.1


             reply	other threads:[~2023-03-14 21:01 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 4+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
2023-03-14 21:00 Linus Walleij [this message]
2023-03-15 15:14 ` [PATCH v2] leds: Mark GPIO LED trigger broken Lee Jones
2023-08-24 18:32 ` Jan Kundrát
2023-09-11  9:17   ` Linus Walleij

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