Re: [Kernel-discuss] Re: [RFC, PATCH 0/4] SoC base drivers

Dmitry Krivoschekov
2007-05-01T21:17:27Z

Hello Paul,

Paul Sokolovsky wrote:
>> ASIC-related code (I mean core) forms additional platform layer, so I
>> suggest
>> adding ASIC helpers to generic platform code i.e. drivers/platform.c, but
>> ASIC drivers to drivers/asic/ directory.
>
> There problem here is the same - our target chips are not
> just ASICs.

You say they are chips so they are integrated circuits (ICs), they
are designed to solve some specific needs, so they are
application-specific ICs, i.e. ASICs, what's the problem?

> It just happens that the one we start with called such,
> but we have different ones too.

Interesting what are they?
Power management ICs? Power management + audio
+ touchscreen + ADC + USB transceiver + UART + whatever
all such chips may be considered as ASICs.

> It's still important that they contain
> blocks with different functionality, and drivers we propose deal with
> basic, common functionality of chips.

That different functionality blocks will be handled by appropriate
device drivers, and in general the drivers should not depend on
a particular ASIC but use common ASIC API.
But "common functionality" drivers are ASIC-specific.

> Now that it was pointed out that
> there's place in the tree for such drivers, it would be not wise to
> try to create another one.
>
>
>

Perhaps, so. Actually, MFD (multi functional device) doesn't
imply a platform-level device but ASIC seems does.

Thanks,
Dmitry