1Sony Programmable I/O Control Device Driver Readme
2--------------------------------------------------
3	Copyright (C) 2001-2004 Stelian Pop <stelian@popies.net>
4	Copyright (C) 2001-2002 Alcôve <www.alcove.com>
5	Copyright (C) 2001 Michael Ashley <m.ashley@unsw.edu.au>
6	Copyright (C) 2001 Junichi Morita <jun1m@mars.dti.ne.jp>
7	Copyright (C) 2000 Takaya Kinjo <t-kinjo@tc4.so-net.ne.jp>
8	Copyright (C) 2000 Andrew Tridgell <tridge@samba.org>
9
10This driver enables access to the Sony Programmable I/O Control Device which
11can be found in many Sony Vaio laptops. Some newer Sony laptops (seems to be
12limited to new FX series laptops, at least the FX501 and the FX702) lack a
13sonypi device and are not supported at all by this driver.
14
15It will give access (through a user space utility) to some events those laptops
16generate, like:
17	- jogdial events (the small wheel on the side of Vaios)
18	- capture button events (only on Vaio Picturebook series)
19	- Fn keys
20	- bluetooth button (only on C1VR model)
21	- programmable keys, back, help, zoom, thumbphrase buttons, etc.
22	  (when available)
23
24Those events (see linux/sonypi.h) can be polled using the character device node
25/dev/sonypi (major 10, minor auto allocated or specified as a option).
26A simple daemon which translates the jogdial movements into mouse wheel events
27can be downloaded at: <http://popies.net/sonypi/>
28
29Another option to intercept the events is to get them directly through the
30input layer.
31
32This driver supports also some ioctl commands for setting the LCD screen
33brightness and querying the batteries charge information (some more
34commands may be added in the future).
35
36This driver can also be used to set the camera controls on Picturebook series
37(brightness, contrast etc), and is used by the video4linux driver for the
38Motion Eye camera.
39
40Please note that this driver was created by reverse engineering the Windows
41driver and the ACPI BIOS, because Sony doesn't agree to release any programming
42specs for its laptops. If someone convinces them to do so, drop me a note.
43
44Driver options:
45---------------
46
47Several options can be passed to the sonypi driver using the standard
48module argument syntax (<param>=<value> when passing the option to the
49module or sonypi.<param>=<value> on the kernel boot line when sonypi is
50statically linked into the kernel). Those options are:
51
52	minor: 		minor number of the misc device /dev/sonypi,
53			default is -1 (automatic allocation, see /proc/misc
54			or kernel logs)
55
56	camera:		if you have a PictureBook series Vaio (with the
57			integrated MotionEye camera), set this parameter to 1
58			in order to let the driver access to the camera
59
60	fnkeyinit:	on some Vaios (C1VE, C1VR etc), the Fn key events don't
61			get enabled unless you set this parameter to 1.
62			Do not use this option unless it's actually necessary,
63			some Vaio models don't deal well with this option.
64			This option is available only if the kernel is
65			compiled without ACPI support (since it conflicts
66			with it and it shouldn't be required anyway if
67			ACPI is already enabled).
68
69	verbose:	set to 1 to print unknown events received from the
70			sonypi device.
71			set to 2 to print all events received from the
72			sonypi device.
73
74	compat:		uses some compatibility code for enabling the sonypi
75			events. If the driver worked for you in the past
76			(prior to version 1.5) and does not work anymore,
77			add this option and report to the author.
78
79	mask:		event mask telling the driver what events will be
80			reported to the user. This parameter is required for
81			some Vaio models where the hardware reuses values
82			used in other Vaio models (like the FX series who does
83			not have a jogdial but reuses the jogdial events for
84			programmable keys events). The default event mask is
85			set to 0xffffffff, meaning that all possible events
86			will be tried. You can use the following bits to
87			construct your own event mask (from
88			drivers/char/sonypi.h):
89				SONYPI_JOGGER_MASK 		0x0001
90				SONYPI_CAPTURE_MASK 		0x0002
91				SONYPI_FNKEY_MASK 		0x0004
92				SONYPI_BLUETOOTH_MASK 		0x0008
93				SONYPI_PKEY_MASK 		0x0010
94				SONYPI_BACK_MASK 		0x0020
95				SONYPI_HELP_MASK 		0x0040
96				SONYPI_LID_MASK 		0x0080
97				SONYPI_ZOOM_MASK 		0x0100
98				SONYPI_THUMBPHRASE_MASK 	0x0200
99				SONYPI_MEYE_MASK		0x0400
100				SONYPI_MEMORYSTICK_MASK		0x0800
101				SONYPI_BATTERY_MASK		0x1000
102				SONYPI_WIRELESS_MASK		0x2000
103
104	useinput:	if set (which is the default) two input devices are
105			created, one which interprets the jogdial events as
106			mouse events, the other one which acts like a
107			keyboard reporting the pressing of the special keys.
108
109Module use:
110-----------
111
112In order to automatically load the sonypi module on use, you can put those
113lines a configuration file in /etc/modprobe.d/:
114
115	alias char-major-10-250 sonypi
116	options sonypi minor=250
117
118This supposes the use of minor 250 for the sonypi device:
119
120	# mknod /dev/sonypi c 10 250
121
122Bugs:
123-----
124
125	- several users reported that this driver disables the BIOS-managed
126	  Fn-keys which put the laptop in sleeping state, or switch the
127	  external monitor on/off. There is no workaround yet, since this
128	  driver disables all APM management for those keys, by enabling the
129	  ACPI management (and the ACPI core stuff is not complete yet). If
130	  you have one of those laptops with working Fn keys and want to
131	  continue to use them, don't use this driver.
132
133	- some users reported that the laptop speed is lower (dhrystone
134	  tested) when using the driver with the fnkeyinit parameter. I cannot
135	  reproduce it on my laptop and not all users have this problem.
136	  This happens because the fnkeyinit parameter enables the ACPI
137	  mode (but without additional ACPI control, like processor
138	  speed handling etc). Use ACPI instead of APM if it works on your
139	  laptop.
140
141	- sonypi lacks the ability to distinguish between certain key
142	  events on some models.
143
144	- some models with the nvidia card (geforce go 6200 tc) uses a
145	  different way to adjust the backlighting of the screen. There
146	  is a userspace utility to adjust the brightness on those models,
147	  which can be downloaded from
148	  http://www.acc.umu.se/~erikw/program/smartdimmer-0.1.tar.bz2
149
150	- since all development was done by reverse engineering, there is
151	  _absolutely no guarantee_ that this driver will not crash your
152	  laptop. Permanently.
153