Re: [PATCH v2 1/3] auxdisplay: Take over maintainership, but in Odd Fixes mode

Geert Uytterhoeven
2024-02-13T08:34:39Z

Hi Thomas,

On Tue, Feb 13, 2024 at 9:28 AM Thomas Zimmermann <tzimmermann@suse.de> wrote:
> Am 12.02.24 um 17:42 schrieb Andy Shevchenko:
> > On Mon, Feb 12, 2024 at 05:33:39PM +0100, Thomas Zimmermann wrote:
> >> (cc'ing Javier Martinez Canillas)
> >> Am 12.02.24 um 14:23 schrieb Andy Shevchenko:
> >>> I have no time for this, but since it looks like I'm the main
> >>> contributor for the last few years to the subsystem, I'll take
> >>> it for now. Geert agreed to help me with as a designated reviwer.
> >>> Let's see how it will go...
> >> A few days ago, I talked to Javier about how auxdisplay is a hotchpodge of
> >> various drivers that seem to belong into other subsystems. Could we attempt
> >> to move all drivers into other places and then remove the auxdisplay
> >> subsystem?
> > Can you be more precise on how it can be done? We have at least two clusters of
> > the displays: line-display and HD44780-based ones. Moreover, the latter might
> > use the former in the future (in some cases).
>
> I see. Taking a closer look, it's not as simple as I implied.
>
> We noticed that cfag1286bfb and ht16k33 are fbdev-based drivers. They
> seem to belong into video/fbdev. But OTOH ht16k33 appears to drive
> 14-segment displays and fbdev appears to be an odd choice for such
> devices. And as Javier already noted, we wondered if these charlcd
> displays aren't just a special case of TTYs.

HT16K33 uses line-display for 7/14-segment displays, and fbdev
for dot-matrix displays. And input for the optional keypad.

I started working on splitting the functionality, at least
CONFIG_*-wise, so you can still build it for line-display with
CONFIG_FB=n, but I was distracted by more important work...

Gr{oetje,eeting}s,

Geert

--
Geert Uytterhoeven -- There's lots of Linux beyond ia32 -- geert@linux-m68k.org

In personal conversations with technical people, I call myself a hacker. But
when I'm talking to journalists I just say "programmer" or something like that.
-- Linus Torvalds