RFC: ACPI namespace

[Richard Hughes]

On Sat, 08 Jan 2005 16:02:57 +0100, Sjoerd Simons wrote:
> Your right. I would need to checkout if i can get that info, but if the kernel
> knows it it should be possible :).. It would be nice if we could represent both
> cases in hal..
> 

See Roberts' post on this...

> 
> I would try to leave the intelligence out of hal and just force the
> applications to specify an available frequency (or something like the next high
> freq.).. I can image that when programming a cpu freq manager, you want to just
> switch to a higher or lower frequency most of the time. Needing to play with
> percent indicators to see what happens looks cumbersome.. 

Agree.

>> What's a light sensor? What's it for? Sorry if I'm being dense...
> 
> Being dense is good :).. On my laptop there are light sensors on both sides
> of the keyboard. A little deamon uses the information for these to
> automagically adapt the lcd brightness and the keyboard light to the ambient
> light :)  (Thus when the lightlevel goes down the lcd brightness is turned down
> and when dark enough the keyboard light is turned on)

That's proper cool. My LCD bedroom clock has done this for YEARS, and I
wondered how long laptops would take to copy this idea.
Makes my Toshiba Satellite Pro A10 look quite shabby. :-)

> In my view, fan speed, temperature and light readers all fall under sensors. I
> guess it could be nice to have one object per sensor, with keys like
> sensor.location (cpu/gpu/left of keyboard etc), sensor.type
> (light/fanspeed/temperature etc) and maybe sensor.device which can optionally
> bind it to a certain device.

I'm agreed, do you mean a plan such as this:

-------------------------------------------
system.sensors namespace:
-------------------------------------------
Device objects with the capability system.sensors represent all
light and temperature sensors in the system. The following properties are
available:

Key: 		system.sensor.type (string)
Mandatory: 	Yes
Values:
 light: 	Light sensor
 temperature: 	Temperature sensor
Description: 	The type of sensor device

Key: 		system.sensor.location (string)
Mandatory: 	Yes
Values:
 gpu: 		Measures GPU source
 cpu: 		Measures CPU source
 external: 	Measures external source
 other: 	Measuring other source
Description: 	The location of the sensor device

Key: 		system.sensor.device (????)
Mandatory: 	No
Description: 	HAL device reference

>   
>> Has any work been done in the past on HAL to support probing of
>> monitors/LCDs?
> 
> Don't think so.. And this is almost rocket science. For laptops displays it's
> reasonable simple to get brightness (at least on my powerbook), but for the
> other properties...

Same here, except I have to use the toshiba specific extensions in
/proc/acpi/toshiba - which complicates the schema a bit.

Shall we work on getting namespace acpi/pmu into HAL before we tackle
the LCD's? 

Thanks, Richard

NEW PROPOSED NAMESPACES:

###########################################
Namespace:	pmu
Description:	Device objects with the capability pmu represent devices currently accessed through the PMU bus /dev/pmu.
###########################################

Key:		pmu.version (string)
Mandatory:	No
Description:	The in-kernel driver version providing PMU services.

###########################################
Namespace:	acpi
Description:	Device objects with the capability acpi represent devices currently accessed through the ACPI bus and found in /proc/acpi.
###########################################

Key:		acpi.version (string)
Mandatory:	No
Description:	The in-kernel driver version providing ACPI services. Usually of the form 20041210.

###########################################
Namespace:	system
Description:	Device objects with the capability system represent all the system devices currently accessed through the ACPI and PMU bus.
###########################################

-------------------------------------------
Namespace:	system.ac_adaptor
Description:	Device objects with the capability system.ac_adaptor represent all the devices capable of powering the system from AC power. The following property is available:
-------------------------------------------

Key:		system.ac_adaptor.enabled (bool)
Mandatory:	Yes
Description:	The state of the adaptor, i.e. whether it is providing power to the unit.

-------------------------------------------
Namespace:	system.button
Description:	Device objects with the capability system.button represent all the devices capable of providing a state to the system. The following property is available:
-------------------------------------------

Key:		system.button.type (string)
Mandatory:	Yes
Values:
 lid_switch: 	The switch on a laptop that senses whether the lid is open or closed. 
 power: 	The main power button on the computer
 sleep: 	The sleep button on a computer capable of putting the computer into a suspend state.

-------------------------------------------
Namespace:	system.processor
Description:	Device objects with the capability system.processor represent all CPU's in the system. The following properties are available:
-------------------------------------------

Key:		system.processor.number (int)
Mandatory:	Yes
Description:	The internal processor number in the system

Key:		system.processor.can_throttle (bool)
Mandatory:	No
Description:	Whether the processor supports throttling to decrease it's own clock speed.

Key:		system.processor.throttle_frequencies (string)
Mandatory:	No
Description:	A simple string showing the allowed frequencies and/or ranges of the frequency of the CPU. Values are in MHz.
Key:		Only valid if system.processor.can_throttle is TRUE

Key:		system.processor.maximum_speed (long)
Mandatory:	No
Description:	The speed of the processor in units of MHz

#Key:		system.processor.temperature (int)
#Mandatory:	No
#Description:	The temperature of the processor in degrees Celsius

-------------------------------------------
Namespace:	system.display_device
Description:	Device objects with the capability display_device represent all display devices in the system. The following properties are available:
-------------------------------------------

Key:		system.display_device.type (string)
Mandatory:	Yes
Values:
 lcd: 		LCD panel
 crt: 		CRT tube
 tv_out: 	TV Out
Description:	The type of display device

Key:		system.display_device.lcd.brightness (int)
Mandatory:	No
Description:	The brightness of the LCD panel in percent
Key:		Only valid if system.display_device.type is lcd

-------------------------------------------
Namespace:	system.sensors
Description:	Device objects with the capability system.sensors represent all light and temperature sensors in the system. The following properties are available:
-------------------------------------------

Key:		system.sensor.type (string)
Mandatory:	Yes
Values:
 light: 	Light sensor
 temperature: 	Temperature sensor
Description:	The type of sensor device

Key:		system.sensor.location (string)
Mandatory:	Yes
Values:
 gpu: 		Measures GPU source
 cpu: 		Measures CPU source
 external: 	Measures external source
 other: 	Measuring other source
Description:	The location of the sensor device

Key:		system.sensor.device (????)
Mandatory:	No
Description:	HAL device reference


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