xref: /linux/Documentation/leds/ledtrig-transient.rst (revision 962fad301c33dec69324dc2d9320fd84a119a24c)
1=====================
2LED Transient Trigger
3=====================
4
5The leds timer trigger does not currently have an interface to activate
6a one shot timer. The current support allows for setting two timers, one for
7specifying how long a state to be on, and the second for how long the state
8to be off. The delay_on value specifies the time period an LED should stay
9in on state, followed by a delay_off value that specifies how long the LED
10should stay in off state. The on and off cycle repeats until the trigger
11gets deactivated. There is no provision for one time activation to implement
12features that require an on or off state to be held just once and then stay in
13the original state forever.
14
15Without one shot timer interface, user space can still use timer trigger to
16set a timer to hold a state, however when user space application crashes or
17goes away without deactivating the timer, the hardware will be left in that
18state permanently.
19
20As a specific example of this use-case, let's look at vibrate feature on
21phones. Vibrate function on phones is implemented using PWM pins on SoC or
22PMIC. There is a need to activate one shot timer to control the vibrate
23feature, to prevent user space crashes leaving the phone in vibrate mode
24permanently causing the battery to drain.
25
26Transient trigger addresses the need for one shot timer activation. The
27transient trigger can be enabled and disabled just like the other leds
28triggers.
29
30When an led class device driver registers itself, it can specify all leds
31triggers it supports and a default trigger. During registration, activation
32routine for the default trigger gets called. During registration of an led
33class device, the LED state does not change.
34
35When the driver unregisters, deactivation routine for the currently active
36trigger will be called, and LED state is changed to LED_OFF.
37
38Driver suspend changes the LED state to LED_OFF and resume doesn't change
39the state. Please note that there is no explicit interaction between the
40suspend and resume actions and the currently enabled trigger. LED state
41changes are suspended while the driver is in suspend state. Any timers
42that are active at the time driver gets suspended, continue to run, without
43being able to actually change the LED state. Once driver is resumed, triggers
44start functioning again.
45
46LED state changes are controlled using brightness which is a common led
47class device property. When brightness is set to 0 from user space via
48echo 0 > brightness, it will result in deactivating the current trigger.
49
50Transient trigger uses standard register and unregister interfaces. During
51trigger registration, for each led class device that specifies this trigger
52as its default trigger, trigger activation routine will get called. During
53registration, the LED state does not change, unless there is another trigger
54active, in which case LED state changes to LED_OFF.
55
56During trigger unregistration, LED state gets changed to LED_OFF.
57
58Transient trigger activation routine doesn't change the LED state. It
59creates its properties and does its initialization. Transient trigger
60deactivation routine, will cancel any timer that is active before it cleans
61up and removes the properties it created. It will restore the LED state to
62non-transient state. When driver gets suspended, irrespective of the transient
63state, the LED state changes to LED_OFF.
64
65Transient trigger can be enabled and disabled from user space on led class
66devices, that support this trigger as shown below::
67
68	echo transient > trigger
69	echo none > trigger
70
71NOTE:
72	Add a new property trigger state to control the state.
73
74This trigger exports three properties, activate, state, and duration. When
75transient trigger is activated these properties are set to default values.
76
77- duration allows setting timer value in msecs. The initial value is 0.
78- activate allows activating and deactivating the timer specified by
79  duration as needed. The initial and default value is 0.  This will allow
80  duration to be set after trigger activation.
81- state allows user to specify a transient state to be held for the specified
82  duration.
83
84	activate
85	      - one shot timer activate mechanism.
86		1 when activated, 0 when deactivated.
87		default value is zero when transient trigger is enabled,
88		to allow duration to be set.
89
90		activate state indicates a timer with a value of specified
91		duration running.
92		deactivated state indicates that there is no active timer
93		running.
94
95	duration
96	      - one shot timer value. When activate is set, duration value
97		is used to start a timer that runs once. This value doesn't
98		get changed by the trigger unless user does a set via
99		echo new_value > duration
100
101	state
102	      - transient state to be held. It has two values 0 or 1. 0 maps
103		to LED_OFF and 1 maps to LED_FULL. The specified state is
104		held for the duration of the one shot timer and then the
105		state gets changed to the non-transient state which is the
106		inverse of transient state.
107		If state = LED_FULL, when the timer runs out the state will
108		go back to LED_OFF.
109		If state = LED_OFF, when the timer runs out the state will
110		go back to LED_FULL.
111		Please note that current LED state is not checked prior to
112		changing the state to the specified state.
113		Driver could map these values to inverted depending on the
114		default states it defines for the LED in its brightness_set()
115		interface which is called from the led brightness_set()
116		interfaces to control the LED state.
117
118When timer expires activate goes back to deactivated state, duration is left
119at the set value to be used when activate is set at a future time. This will
120allow user app to set the time once and activate it to run it once for the
121specified value as needed. When timer expires, state is restored to the
122non-transient state which is the inverse of the transient state:
123
124	=================   ===============================================
125	echo 1 > activate   starts timer = duration when duration is not 0.
126	echo 0 > activate   cancels currently running timer.
127	echo n > duration   stores timer value to be used upon next
128			    activate. Currently active timer if
129			    any, continues to run for the specified time.
130	echo 0 > duration   stores timer value to be used upon next
131			    activate. Currently active timer if any,
132			    continues to run for the specified time.
133	echo 1 > state      stores desired transient state LED_FULL to be
134			    held for the specified duration.
135	echo 0 > state      stores desired transient state LED_OFF to be
136			    held for the specified duration.
137	=================   ===============================================
138
139What is not supported
140=====================
141
142- Timer activation is one shot and extending and/or shortening the timer
143  is not supported.
144
145Examples
146========
147
148use-case 1::
149
150	echo transient > trigger
151	echo n > duration
152	echo 1 > state
153
154repeat the following step as needed::
155
156	echo 1 > activate - start timer = duration to run once
157	echo 1 > activate - start timer = duration to run once
158	echo none > trigger
159
160This trigger is intended to be used for the following example use cases:
161
162 - Control of vibrate (phones, tablets etc.) hardware by user space app.
163 - Use of LED by user space app as activity indicator.
164 - Use of LED by user space app as a kind of watchdog indicator -- as
165   long as the app is alive, it can keep the LED illuminated, if it dies
166   the LED will be extinguished automatically.
167 - Use by any user space app that needs a transient GPIO output.
168