Re: [PATCH] gpio: Add driver for TI TPIC2810

[Javier Martinez Canillas <javier@dowhile0.org>]

Hello Andrew,

[snip]

>
>>> +static const struct i2c_device_id tpic2810_id_table[] = {
>>> +       { "tpic2810", },
>>> +       { /* sentinel */ }
>>> +};
>>> +MODULE_DEVICE_TABLE(i2c, tpic2810_id_table);
>>> +
>>> +static struct i2c_driver tpic2810_driver = {
>>> +       .driver = {
>>> +               .name = "tpic2810",
>>> +       },
>>> +       .probe = tpic2810_probe,
>>> +       .remove = tpic2810_remove,
>>> +       .id_table = tpic2810_id_table,
>>> +};
>>> +module_i2c_driver(tpic2810_driver);
>>
>>
>> No device tree probing? Which platform uses this?
>> I was expecting an .of_match_table()  in .driver.
>>
>
> As far as I know .of_match_table and MODULE_ALIAS for
> DT have no real effect on I2C devices as they match
> on "anything,i2c_name". And only throw an I2C
> MODALIAS to userspace for loading. So we can use
> this device in a DTS without any driver modifications.
>
> At least it worked like this on my test platform
> (am57xx-evm).
>

Is true that it works due how the I2C core is implemented but IMHO
that is wrong and should be fixed at some point.

I posted a patch series [0] to fix most of the I2C drivers in
preparation for this so please add a proper OF table to not introduce
yet another issue to fix.

> I think it might be best to keep drivers DT agnostic
> when possible, in case DT is superseded by something,
> so we don't end up with mountains of dead code.
>

It isn't mountain of code but just simple tables to match a device
with a driver and to report proper module aliases.

The problem with using the I2C device ID as a fallback is that the DT
binding doc list the compatible strings that are valid for this device
but DTB can use "anything,i2c_name" as you said or just "i2c_name" and
so not following the DT bindings.

Also, it would cause problems if there are two I2C drivers with the
same "i2c_name" but a different vendor, so the vendor prefix is
important.

> Thanks,
> Andrew
>

[0]: https://lkml.org/lkml/2015/7/30/519

Best regards,
Javier