1.. Copyright 2007-2008 Wolfson Microelectronics
2
3..   This documentation is free software; you can redistribute
4..   it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public
5..   License version 2 as published by the Free Software Foundation.
6
7=================================
8Voltage and current regulator API
9=================================
10
11:Author: Liam Girdwood
12:Author: Mark Brown
13
14Introduction
15============
16
17This framework is designed to provide a standard kernel interface to
18control voltage and current regulators.
19
20The intention is to allow systems to dynamically control regulator power
21output in order to save power and prolong battery life. This applies to
22both voltage regulators (where voltage output is controllable) and
23current sinks (where current limit is controllable).
24
25Note that additional (and currently more complete) documentation is
26available in the Linux kernel source under
27``Documentation/power/regulator``.
28
29Glossary
30--------
31
32The regulator API uses a number of terms which may not be familiar:
33
34Regulator
35
36    Electronic device that supplies power to other devices. Most regulators
37    can enable and disable their output and some can also control their
38    output voltage or current.
39
40Consumer
41
42    Electronic device which consumes power provided by a regulator. These
43    may either be static, requiring only a fixed supply, or dynamic,
44    requiring active management of the regulator at runtime.
45
46Power Domain
47
48    The electronic circuit supplied by a given regulator, including the
49    regulator and all consumer devices. The configuration of the regulator
50    is shared between all the components in the circuit.
51
52Power Management Integrated Circuit (PMIC)
53
54    An IC which contains numerous regulators and often also other
55    subsystems. In an embedded system the primary PMIC is often equivalent
56    to a combination of the PSU and southbridge in a desktop system.
57
58Consumer driver interface
59=========================
60
61This offers a similar API to the kernel clock framework. Consumer
62drivers use `get <#API-regulator-get>`__ and
63`put <#API-regulator-put>`__ operations to acquire and release
64regulators. Functions are provided to `enable <#API-regulator-enable>`__
65and `disable <#API-regulator-disable>`__ the regulator and to get and
66set the runtime parameters of the regulator.
67
68When requesting regulators consumers use symbolic names for their
69supplies, such as "Vcc", which are mapped into actual regulator devices
70by the machine interface.
71
72A stub version of this API is provided when the regulator framework is
73not in use in order to minimise the need to use ifdefs.
74
75Enabling and disabling
76----------------------
77
78The regulator API provides reference counted enabling and disabling of
79regulators. Consumer devices use the :c:func:`regulator_enable()` and
80:c:func:`regulator_disable()` functions to enable and disable
81regulators. Calls to the two functions must be balanced.
82
83Note that since multiple consumers may be using a regulator and machine
84constraints may not allow the regulator to be disabled there is no
85guarantee that calling :c:func:`regulator_disable()` will actually
86cause the supply provided by the regulator to be disabled. Consumer
87drivers should assume that the regulator may be enabled at all times.
88
89Configuration
90-------------
91
92Some consumer devices may need to be able to dynamically configure their
93supplies. For example, MMC drivers may need to select the correct
94operating voltage for their cards. This may be done while the regulator
95is enabled or disabled.
96
97The :c:func:`regulator_set_voltage()` and
98:c:func:`regulator_set_current_limit()` functions provide the primary
99interface for this. Both take ranges of voltages and currents, supporting
100drivers that do not require a specific value (eg, CPU frequency scaling
101normally permits the CPU to use a wider range of supply voltages at lower
102frequencies but does not require that the supply voltage be lowered). Where
103an exact value is required both minimum and maximum values should be
104identical.
105
106Callbacks
107---------
108
109Callbacks may also be registered for events such as regulation failures.
110
111Regulator driver interface
112==========================
113
114Drivers for regulator chips register the regulators with the regulator
115core, providing operations structures to the core. A notifier interface
116allows error conditions to be reported to the core.
117
118Registration should be triggered by explicit setup done by the platform,
119supplying a struct regulator_init_data for the regulator
120containing constraint and supply information.
121
122Machine interface
123=================
124
125This interface provides a way to define how regulators are connected to
126consumers on a given system and what the valid operating parameters are
127for the system.
128
129Supplies
130--------
131
132Regulator supplies are specified using struct
133:c:type:`regulator_consumer_supply`. This is done at driver registration
134time as part of the machine constraints.
135
136Constraints
137-----------
138
139As well as defining the connections the machine interface also provides
140constraints defining the operations that clients are allowed to perform
141and the parameters that may be set. This is required since generally
142regulator devices will offer more flexibility than it is safe to use on
143a given system, for example supporting higher supply voltages than the
144consumers are rated for.
145
146This is done at driver registration time` by providing a
147struct regulation_constraints.
148
149The constraints may also specify an initial configuration for the
150regulator in the constraints, which is particularly useful for use with
151static consumers.
152
153API reference
154=============
155
156Due to limitations of the kernel documentation framework and the
157existing layout of the source code the entire regulator API is
158documented here.
159
160.. kernel-doc:: include/linux/regulator/consumer.h
161   :internal:
162
163.. kernel-doc:: include/linux/regulator/machine.h
164   :internal:
165
166.. kernel-doc:: include/linux/regulator/driver.h
167   :internal:
168
169.. kernel-doc:: drivers/regulator/core.c
170   :export:
171