[PATCH v6 11/12] Documentation: admin-guide: laptops: Add documentation for alienware-wmi

Kurt Borja
2025-03-13T14:30:35Z

Add driver admin-guide documentation for the alienware-wmi driver.

Reviewed-by: Armin Wolf <W_Armin@gmx.de>
Signed-off-by: Kurt Borja <kuurtb@gmail.com>
---
.../admin-guide/laptops/alienware-wmi.rst | 128 +++++++++++++++++++++
Documentation/admin-guide/laptops/index.rst | 1 +
MAINTAINERS | 1 +
3 files changed, 130 insertions(+)

diff --git a/Documentation/admin-guide/laptops/alienware-wmi.rst b/Documentation/admin-guide/laptops/alienware-wmi.rst
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..fe7dec73706f8ec85040dc1cbaec38ffda70b563
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Documentation/admin-guide/laptops/alienware-wmi.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,128 @@
+.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-or-later
+
+====================
+Alienware WMI Driver
+====================
+
+Kurt Borja <kuurtb@gmail.com>
+
+This is a driver for the "WMAX" WMI device, which is found in most Dell gaming
+laptops and controls various special features.
+
+Before the launch of M-Series laptops (~2018), the "WMAX" device controlled
+basic RGB lighting, deep sleep mode, HDMI mode and amplifier status.
+
+Later, this device was completely repurpused. Now it mostly deals with thermal
+profiles, sensor monitoring and overclocking. This interface is named "AWCC" and
+is known to be used by the AWCC OEM application to control these features.
+
+The alienware-wmi driver controls both interfaces.
+
+AWCC Interface
+==============
+
+WMI device documentation: Documentation/wmi/devices/alienware-wmi.rst
+
+Supported devices
+-----------------
+
+- Alienware M-Series laptops
+- Alienware X-Series laptops
+- Alienware Aurora Desktops
+- Dell G-Series laptops
+
+If you believe your device supports the AWCC interface and you don't have any of
+the features described in this document, try the following alienware-wmi module
+parameters:
+
+- ``force_platform_profile=1``: Forces probing for platform profile support
+- ``force_hwmon=1``: Forces probing for HWMON support
+
+If the module loads successfully with these parameters, consider submitting a
+patch adding your model to the ``awcc_dmi_table`` located in
+``drivers/platform/x86/dell/alienware-wmi-wmax.c`` or contacting the maintainer
+for further guidance.
+
+Status
+------
+
+The following features are currently supported:
+
+- :ref:`Platform Profile <platform-profile>`:
+
+ - Thermal profile control
+
+ - G-Mode toggling
+
+- :ref:`HWMON <hwmon>`:
+
+ - Sensor monitoring
+
+ - Manual fan control
+
+.. _platform-profile:
+
+Platform Profile
+----------------
+
+The AWCC interface exposes various firmware defined thermal profiles. We expose
+these profiles to user-space through the Platform Profile class interface.
+Refer to
+:ref:`sysfs-class-platform-profile <abi_file_testing_sysfs_class_platform_profile>`
+for more information.
+
+The name of the platform-profile class device exported by this driver is
+"alienware-wmi" and it's path can be found with:
+
+::
+
+ grep -l "alienware-wmi" /sys/class/platform-profile/platform-profile-*/name | sed 's|/[^/]*$||'
+
+If the device supports G-Mode, it is also toggled when selecting the
+``performance`` profile.
+
+.. note::
+ You may set the ``force_gmode`` module parameter to always try to toggle this
+ feature, without checking if your model supports it.
+
+.. _hwmon:
+
+HWMON
+-----
+
+The AWCC interface also supports sensor monitoring and manual fan control. Both
+of these features are exposed to user-space through the HWMON interface.
+
+The name of the hwmon class device exported by this driver is "alienware_wmi"
+and it's path can be found with:
+
+::
+
+ grep -l "alienware_wmi" /sys/class/hwmon/hwmon*/name | sed 's|/[^/]*$||'
+
+Sensor monitoring is done through the standard HWMON interface. Refer to
+:ref:`sysfs-class-hwmon <abi_file_testing_sysfs_class_hwmon>` for more
+information.
+
+Manual fan control on the other hand, is not exposed directly by the AWCC
+interface. Instead it let's us control a fan `boost` value. This `boost` value
+has the following aproximate behavior over the fan pwm:
+
+::
+
+ pwm = pwm_base + (fan_boost / 255) * (pwm_max - pwm_base)
+
+Due to the above behavior, we expose the fan `boost` control to user-space
+through the following, custom hwmon sysfs attribute:
+
+=============================== ======= =======================================
+Name Perm Description
+=============================== ======= =======================================
+fan[1-4]_boost RW Fan boost value.
+
+ Integer value between 0 and 255
+=============================== ======= =======================================
+
+.. note::
+ In some devices, manual fan control only works reliably if the ``custom``
+ platform profile is selected.
diff --git a/Documentation/admin-guide/laptops/index.rst b/Documentation/admin-guide/laptops/index.rst
index e71c8984c23e43ca7cd6373b88803354dff6bc60..db842b629303c1bcf02646204d51938f9bd4043e 100644
--- a/Documentation/admin-guide/laptops/index.rst
+++ b/Documentation/admin-guide/laptops/index.rst
@@ -7,6 +7,7 @@ Laptop Drivers
.. toctree::
:maxdepth: 1

+ alienware-wmi
asus-laptop
disk-shock-protection
laptop-mode
diff --git a/MAINTAINERS b/MAINTAINERS
index 1afd30d00aecf9a48f8c71e156affd5f329539bd..c609bc321b8dc3ab0e8d92b04e42483be8cc171c 100644
--- a/MAINTAINERS
+++ b/MAINTAINERS
@@ -796,6 +796,7 @@ M: Kurt Borja <kuurtb@gmail.com>
L: platform-driver-x86@vger.kernel.org
L: Dell.Client.Kernel@dell.com
S: Maintained
+F: Documentation/admin-guide/laptops/alienware-wmi.rst
F: Documentation/wmi/devices/alienware-wmi.rst
F: drivers/platform/x86/dell/alienware-wmi*

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2.48.1