1ACPI Device Tree - Representation of ACPI Namespace
2
3Copyright (C) 2013, Intel Corporation
4Author: Lv Zheng <lv.zheng@intel.com>
5
6
7Abstract:
8
9The Linux ACPI subsystem converts ACPI namespace objects into a Linux
10device tree under the /sys/devices/LNXSYSTEM:00 and updates it upon
11receiving ACPI hotplug notification events.  For each device object in this
12hierarchy there is a corresponding symbolic link in the
13/sys/bus/acpi/devices.
14This document illustrates the structure of the ACPI device tree.
15
16
17Credit:
18
19Thanks for the help from Zhang Rui <rui.zhang@intel.com> and Rafael J.
20Wysocki <rafael.j.wysocki@intel.com>.
21
22
231. ACPI Definition Blocks
24
25   The ACPI firmware sets up RSDP (Root System Description Pointer) in the
26   system memory address space pointing to the XSDT (Extended System
27   Description Table).  The XSDT always points to the FADT (Fixed ACPI
28   Description Table) using its first entry, the data within the FADT
29   includes various fixed-length entries that describe fixed ACPI features
30   of the hardware.  The FADT contains a pointer to the DSDT
31   (Differentiated System Descripition Table).  The XSDT also contains
32   entries pointing to possibly multiple SSDTs (Secondary System
33   Description Table).
34
35   The DSDT and SSDT data is organized in data structures called definition
36   blocks that contain definitions of various objects, including ACPI
37   control methods, encoded in AML (ACPI Machine Language).  The data block
38   of the DSDT along with the contents of SSDTs represents a hierarchical
39   data structure called the ACPI namespace whose topology reflects the
40   structure of the underlying hardware platform.
41
42   The relationships between ACPI System Definition Tables described above
43   are illustrated in the following diagram.
44
45     +---------+    +-------+    +--------+    +------------------------+
46     |  RSDP   | +->| XSDT  | +->|  FADT  |    |  +-------------------+ |
47     +---------+ |  +-------+ |  +--------+  +-|->|       DSDT        | |
48     | Pointer | |  | Entry |-+  | ...... |  | |  +-------------------+ |
49     +---------+ |  +-------+    | X_DSDT |--+ |  | Definition Blocks | |
50     | Pointer |-+  | ..... |    | ...... |    |  +-------------------+ |
51     +---------+    +-------+    +--------+    |  +-------------------+ |
52                    | Entry |------------------|->|       SSDT        | |
53                    +- - - -+                  |  +-------------------| |
54                    | Entry | - - - - - - - -+ |  | Definition Blocks | |
55                    +- - - -+                | |  +-------------------+ |
56                                             | |  +- - - - - - - - - -+ |
57                                             +-|->|       SSDT        | |
58                                               |  +-------------------+ |
59                                               |  | Definition Blocks | |
60                                               |  +- - - - - - - - - -+ |
61                                               +------------------------+
62                                                           |
63                                              OSPM Loading |
64                                                          \|/
65                                                    +----------------+
66                                                    | ACPI Namespace |
67                                                    +----------------+
68
69                     Figure 1. ACPI Definition Blocks
70
71   NOTE: RSDP can also contain a pointer to the RSDT (Root System
72         Description Table).  Platforms provide RSDT to enable
73         compatibility with ACPI 1.0 operating systems.  The OS is expected
74         to use XSDT, if present.
75
76
772. Example ACPI Namespace
78
79   All definition blocks are loaded into a single namespace.  The namespace
80   is a hierarchy of objects identified by names and paths.
81   The following naming conventions apply to object names in the ACPI
82   namespace:
83   1. All names are 32 bits long.
84   2. The first byte of a name must be one of 'A' - 'Z', '_'.
85   3. Each of the remaining bytes of a name must be one of 'A' - 'Z', '0'
86      - '9', '_'.
87   4. Names starting with '_' are reserved by the ACPI specification.
88   5. The '\' symbol represents the root of the namespace (i.e. names
89      prepended with '\' are relative to the namespace root).
90   6. The '^' symbol represents the parent of the current namespace node
91      (i.e. names prepended with '^' are relative to the parent of the
92      current namespace node).
93
94   The figure below shows an example ACPI namespace.
95
96   +------+
97   | \    |                     Root
98   +------+
99     |
100     | +------+
101     +-| _PR  |                 Scope(_PR): the processor namespace
102     | +------+
103     |   |
104     |   | +------+
105     |   +-| CPU0 |             Processor(CPU0): the first processor
106     |     +------+
107     |
108     | +------+
109     +-| _SB  |                 Scope(_SB): the system bus namespace
110     | +------+
111     |   |
112     |   | +------+
113     |   +-| LID0 |             Device(LID0); the lid device
114     |   | +------+
115     |   |   |
116     |   |   | +------+
117     |   |   +-| _HID |         Name(_HID, "PNP0C0D"): the hardware ID
118     |   |   | +------+
119     |   |   |
120     |   |   | +------+
121     |   |   +-| _STA |         Method(_STA): the status control method
122     |   |     +------+
123     |   |
124     |   | +------+
125     |   +-| PCI0 |             Device(PCI0); the PCI root bridge
126     |     +------+
127     |       |
128     |       | +------+
129     |       +-| _HID |         Name(_HID, "PNP0A08"): the hardware ID
130     |       | +------+
131     |       |
132     |       | +------+
133     |       +-| _CID |         Name(_CID, "PNP0A03"): the compatible ID
134     |       | +------+
135     |       |
136     |       | +------+
137     |       +-| RP03 |         Scope(RP03): the PCI0 power scope
138     |       | +------+
139     |       |   |
140     |       |   | +------+
141     |       |   +-| PXP3 |     PowerResource(PXP3): the PCI0 power resource
142     |       |     +------+
143     |       |
144     |       | +------+
145     |       +-| GFX0 |         Device(GFX0): the graphics adapter
146     |         +------+
147     |           |
148     |           | +------+
149     |           +-| _ADR |     Name(_ADR, 0x00020000): the PCI bus address
150     |           | +------+
151     |           |
152     |           | +------+
153     |           +-| DD01 |     Device(DD01): the LCD output device
154     |             +------+
155     |               |
156     |               | +------+
157     |               +-| _BCL | Method(_BCL): the backlight control method
158     |                 +------+
159     |
160     | +------+
161     +-| _TZ  |                 Scope(_TZ): the thermal zone namespace
162     | +------+
163     |   |
164     |   | +------+
165     |   +-| FN00 |             PowerResource(FN00): the FAN0 power resource
166     |   | +------+
167     |   |
168     |   | +------+
169     |   +-| FAN0 |             Device(FAN0): the FAN0 cooling device
170     |   | +------+
171     |   |   |
172     |   |   | +------+
173     |   |   +-| _HID |         Name(_HID, "PNP0A0B"): the hardware ID
174     |   |     +------+
175     |   |
176     |   | +------+
177     |   +-| TZ00 |             ThermalZone(TZ00); the FAN thermal zone
178     |     +------+
179     |
180     | +------+
181     +-| _GPE |                 Scope(_GPE): the GPE namespace
182       +------+
183
184                     Figure 2. Example ACPI Namespace
185
186
1873. Linux ACPI Device Objects
188
189   The Linux kernel's core ACPI subsystem creates struct acpi_device
190   objects for ACPI namespace objects representing devices, power resources
191   processors, thermal zones.  Those objects are exported to user space via
192   sysfs as directories in the subtree under /sys/devices/LNXSYSTM:00.  The
193   format of their names is <bus_id:instance>, where 'bus_id' refers to the
194   ACPI namespace representation of the given object and 'instance' is used
195   for distinguishing different object of the same 'bus_id' (it is
196   two-digit decimal representation of an unsigned integer).
197
198   The value of 'bus_id' depends on the type of the object whose name it is
199   part of as listed in the table below.
200
201                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
202                |   | Object/Feature  | Table | bus_id   |
203                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
204                | N | Root            | xSDT  | LNXSYSTM |
205                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
206                | N | Device          | xSDT  | _HID     |
207                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
208                | N | Processor       | xSDT  | LNXCPU   |
209                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
210                | N | ThermalZone     | xSDT  | LNXTHERM |
211                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
212                | N | PowerResource   | xSDT  | LNXPOWER |
213                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
214                | N | Other Devices   | xSDT  | device   |
215                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
216                | F | PWR_BUTTON      | FADT  | LNXPWRBN |
217                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
218                | F | SLP_BUTTON      | FADT  | LNXSLPBN |
219                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
220                | M | Video Extension | xSDT  | LNXVIDEO |
221                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
222                | M | ATA Controller  | xSDT  | LNXIOBAY |
223                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
224                | M | Docking Station | xSDT  | LNXDOCK  |
225                +---+-----------------+-------+----------+
226
227                 Table 1. ACPI Namespace Objects Mapping
228
229   The following rules apply when creating struct acpi_device objects on
230   the basis of the contents of ACPI System Description Tables (as
231   indicated by the letter in the first column and the notation in the
232   second column of the table above):
233   N:
234      The object's source is an ACPI namespace node (as indicated by the
235      named object's type in the second column).  In that case the object's
236      directory in sysfs will contain the 'path' attribute whose value is
237      the full path to the node from the namespace root.
238   F:
239      The struct acpi_device object is created for a fixed hardware
240      feature (as indicated by the fixed feature flag's name in the second
241      column), so its sysfs directory will not contain the 'path'
242      attribute.
243   M:
244      The struct acpi_device object is created for an ACPI namespace node
245      with specific control methods (as indicated by the ACPI defined
246      device's type in the second column).  The 'path' attribute containing
247      its namespace path will be present in its sysfs directory.  For
248      example, if the _BCL method is present for an ACPI namespace node, a
249      struct acpi_device object with LNXVIDEO 'bus_id' will be created for
250      it.
251
252   The third column of the above table indicates which ACPI System
253   Description Tables contain information used for the creation of the
254   struct acpi_device objects represented by the given row (xSDT means DSDT
255   or SSDT).
256
257   The forth column of the above table indicates the 'bus_id' generation
258   rule of the struct acpi_device object:
259   _HID:
260      _HID in the last column of the table means that the object's bus_id
261      is derived from the _HID/_CID identification objects present under
262      the corresponding ACPI namespace node. The object's sysfs directory
263      will then contain the 'hid' and 'modalias' attributes that can be
264      used to retrieve the _HID and _CIDs of that object.
265   LNXxxxxx:
266      The 'modalias' attribute is also present for struct acpi_device
267      objects having bus_id of the "LNXxxxxx" form (pseudo devices), in
268      which cases it contains the bus_id string itself.
269   device:
270      'device' in the last column of the table indicates that the object's
271      bus_id cannot be determined from _HID/_CID of the corresponding
272      ACPI namespace node, although that object represents a device (for
273      example, it may be a PCI device with _ADR defined and without _HID
274      or _CID).  In that case the string 'device' will be used as the
275      object's bus_id.
276
277
2784. Linux ACPI Physical Device Glue
279
280   ACPI device (i.e. struct acpi_device) objects may be linked to other
281   objects in the Linux' device hierarchy that represent "physical" devices
282   (for example, devices on the PCI bus).  If that happens, it means that
283   the ACPI device object is a "companion" of a device otherwise
284   represented in a different way and is used (1) to provide configuration
285   information on that device which cannot be obtained by other means and
286   (2) to do specific things to the device with the help of its ACPI
287   control methods.  One ACPI device object may be linked this way to
288   multiple "physical" devices.
289
290   If an ACPI device object is linked to a "physical" device, its sysfs
291   directory contains the "physical_node" symbolic link to the sysfs
292   directory of the target device object.  In turn, the target device's
293   sysfs directory will then contain the "firmware_node" symbolic link to
294   the sysfs directory of the companion ACPI device object.
295   The linking mechanism relies on device identification provided by the
296   ACPI namespace.  For example, if there's an ACPI namespace object
297   representing a PCI device (i.e. a device object under an ACPI namespace
298   object representing a PCI bridge) whose _ADR returns 0x00020000 and the
299   bus number of the parent PCI bridge is 0, the sysfs directory
300   representing the struct acpi_device object created for that ACPI
301   namespace object will contain the 'physical_node' symbolic link to the
302   /sys/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:02:0/ sysfs directory of the
303   corresponding PCI device.
304
305   The linking mechanism is generally bus-specific.  The core of its
306   implementation is located in the drivers/acpi/glue.c file, but there are
307   complementary parts depending on the bus types in question located
308   elsewhere.  For example, the PCI-specific part of it is located in
309   drivers/pci/pci-acpi.c.
310
311
3125. Example Linux ACPI Device Tree
313
314   The sysfs hierarchy of struct acpi_device objects corresponding to the
315   example ACPI namespace illustrated in Figure 2 with the addition of
316   fixed PWR_BUTTON/SLP_BUTTON devices is shown below.
317
318   +--------------+---+-----------------+
319   | LNXSYSTEM:00 | \ | acpi:LNXSYSTEM: |
320   +--------------+---+-----------------+
321     |
322     | +-------------+-----+----------------+
323     +-| LNXPWRBN:00 | N/A | acpi:LNXPWRBN: |
324     | +-------------+-----+----------------+
325     |
326     | +-------------+-----+----------------+
327     +-| LNXSLPBN:00 | N/A | acpi:LNXSLPBN: |
328     | +-------------+-----+----------------+
329     |
330     | +-----------+------------+--------------+
331     +-| LNXCPU:00 | \_PR_.CPU0 | acpi:LNXCPU: |
332     | +-----------+------------+--------------+
333     |
334     | +-------------+-------+----------------+
335     +-| LNXSYBUS:00 | \_SB_ | acpi:LNXSYBUS: |
336     | +-------------+-------+----------------+
337     |   |
338     |   | +- - - - - - - +- - - - - - +- - - - - - - -+
339     |   +-| PNP0C0D:00 | \_SB_.LID0 | acpi:PNP0C0D: |
340     |   | +- - - - - - - +- - - - - - +- - - - - - - -+
341     |   |
342     |   | +------------+------------+-----------------------+
343     |   +-| PNP0A08:00 | \_SB_.PCI0 | acpi:PNP0A08:PNP0A03: |
344     |     +------------+------------+-----------------------+
345     |       |
346     |       | +-----------+-----------------+-----+
347     |       +-| device:00 | \_SB_.PCI0.RP03 | N/A |
348     |       | +-----------+-----------------+-----+
349     |       |   |
350     |       |   | +-------------+----------------------+----------------+
351     |       |   +-| LNXPOWER:00 | \_SB_.PCI0.RP03.PXP3 | acpi:LNXPOWER: |
352     |       |     +-------------+----------------------+----------------+
353     |       |
354     |       | +-------------+-----------------+----------------+
355     |       +-| LNXVIDEO:00 | \_SB_.PCI0.GFX0 | acpi:LNXVIDEO: |
356     |         +-------------+-----------------+----------------+
357     |           |
358     |           | +-----------+-----------------+-----+
359     |           +-| device:01 | \_SB_.PCI0.DD01 | N/A |
360     |             +-----------+-----------------+-----+
361     |
362     | +-------------+-------+----------------+
363     +-| LNXSYBUS:01 | \_TZ_ | acpi:LNXSYBUS: |
364       +-------------+-------+----------------+
365         |
366         | +-------------+------------+----------------+
367         +-| LNXPOWER:0a | \_TZ_.FN00 | acpi:LNXPOWER: |
368         | +-------------+------------+----------------+
369         |
370         | +------------+------------+---------------+
371         +-| PNP0C0B:00 | \_TZ_.FAN0 | acpi:PNP0C0B: |
372         | +------------+------------+---------------+
373         |
374         | +-------------+------------+----------------+
375         +-| LNXTHERM:00 | \_TZ_.TZ00 | acpi:LNXTHERM: |
376           +-------------+------------+----------------+
377
378                  Figure 3. Example Linux ACPI Device Tree
379
380   NOTE: Each node is represented as "object/path/modalias", where:
381         1. 'object' is the name of the object's directory in sysfs.
382         2. 'path' is the ACPI namespace path of the corresponding
383            ACPI namespace object, as returned by the object's 'path'
384            sysfs attribute.
385         3. 'modalias' is the value of the object's 'modalias' sysfs
386            attribute (as described earlier in this document).
387   NOTE: N/A indicates the device object does not have the 'path' or the
388         'modalias' attribute.
389