[tlinux-users:07059] plans for toshiba_acpi

[tlinux-users:07059] plans for toshiba_acpi

[John Belmonte]

Here are my plans for enhancing the "toshiba_acpi" driver, and imploding
the "/proc/acpi/toshiba" interface.

* incorporate ACPI hotkeys patch developed by Daniel Silverstone and
used in Ubuntu Linux.  Available as a run-time option, this creates a
kernel thread which polls the Toshiba firmware for hotkey events, and
passes them along to the ACPI subsystem.

* incorporate /dev/toshiba emulation patch developed by Gintautas
Miliauskas and Charles Schwieters.  Available as a run-time option, this
causes toshiba_acpi to implement the "toshiba" driver's /dev/toshiba
interface (except for hotkey status).  This device provides access to
the Toshiba HCI, which can be employed by userspace tools such as
"toshset" to adjust a laptop's internal Bluetooth device, display, fan,
etc.  This patch has been in use since early 2004 by several users.
Regarding module auto-loading, OS's will have to resolve the ambiguity
of which driver to load (toshiba or toshiba_acpi) when /dev/toshiba is
accessed.

* add run-time option to suppress creation of /proc/acpi/toshiba.  Since
 the above two options cover the existing /proc/acpi/toshiba interface
and more, the proc interface can be disabled once userspace tools catch up.

Please follow up on <acpi-devel@lists.sourceforge.net>.

--John

Re: plans for toshiba_acpi

[Timo Hoenig]

Hi,

On Sun, 2005-06-12 at 10:12 -0400, John Belmonte wrote:

> Here are my plans for enhancing the "toshiba_acpi" driver, and imploding
> the "/proc/acpi/toshiba" interface.
> 
> * incorporate ACPI hotkeys patch developed by Daniel Silverstone and
> used in Ubuntu Linux.  Available as a run-time option, this creates a
> kernel thread which polls the Toshiba firmware for hotkey events, and
> passes them along to the ACPI subsystem.

Since the hotkey values for brightness up and brightness down are
identical on Toshiba laptops, it would also make sense to let the kernel
thread trigger the appropriate SCI command.  This way no user space tool
would be required for this purpose any longer.

[...]

See you,

   Timo



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[tlinux-users:07062] Re: plans for toshiba_acpi

[Jonathan Buzzard]

john@neggie.net said:
> * incorporate /dev/toshiba emulation patch developed by Gintautas Miliauskas
> and Charles Schwieters.  Available as a run-time option, this causes
> toshiba_acpi to implement the "toshiba" driver's /dev/toshiba interface
> (except for hotkey status).  This device provides access to the Toshiba HCI,
> which can be employed by userspace tools such as "toshset" to adjust a
> laptop's internal Bluetooth device, display, fan, etc.  This patch has been
> in use since early 2004 by several users. Regarding module auto-loading, OS's
> will have to resolve the ambiguity of which driver to load (toshiba or
> toshiba_acpi) when /dev/toshiba is accessed. 

Is it not possible to have a combined kernel module that can determine whether
the ACPI subsystem is running or not and fall back to the old style system if
it is not. The only messy bit I see here is that you would need some #ifdef's
to cater for when ACPI is not enabled for a 

I have no particular desire to perpetuate the toshiba kernel driver as it is
now, and it has always been my long term goal to do this. It has only been
held up due to problems in running a 2.6 kernel on my laptop. The system is
entirely hosted with LVM and XFS and early attempts at getting it working where
unsucessful.

If someone else with the time wishes to merge the two Toshiba drivers far be
it for me to stand in their way.


JAB.

-- 
Jonathan A. Buzzard                 Email: jonathan (at) buzzard.me.uk
Northumberland, United Kingdom.       Tel: +44 1661-832195