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I/o Subsystems

This chapter discusses I/O subsystems for embedded systems. It covers basic I/O concepts like port-mapped vs memory-mapped I/O and character vs block devices. It then describes how an I/O subsystem provides a uniform API for applications to interface with different device drivers. It does this through a driver table that maps uniform functions to specific driver routines and a device table that associates devices with their drivers.

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Neha Malviya
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301 views

I/o Subsystems

This chapter discusses I/O subsystems for embedded systems. It covers basic I/O concepts like port-mapped vs memory-mapped I/O and character vs block devices. It then describes how an I/O subsystem provides a uniform API for applications to interface with different device drivers. It does this through a driver table that maps uniform functions to specific driver routines and a device table that associates devices with their drivers.

Uploaded by

Neha Malviya
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Real-Time Concepts for

Embedded Systems

Author: Qing Li with


Caroline Yao

ISBN: 1-57820-124-1
CMPBooks
Chapter 12
I/O Subsystem
Outline
† 12.1 Introduction
† 12.2 Basic I/O Concepts
† 12.3 The I/O Subsystem
12.1 Introduction
† All embedded systems include some form of input
and output (I/O) operations
† Examples of embedded systems built explicitly to
deal with I/O devices:
„ Cell phone, pager, and a handheld MP3 player
† I/O operations are interpreted differently depending
on the viewpoint taken and place different
requirements on the level of understanding of the
hardware details
Introduction (Cont.)
† From the perspective of a system software developer
„ I/O operations imply communicating with the device
„ Programming the device to initiate an I/O request
„ Performing actual data transfer between the device and the system
„ Notifying the requestor when the operation completes
„ Must understand
† the physical properties (e.g. register definitions, access methods) of the
device
† locating the correct instance of the device
† how the device is integrated with rest of the system
† how to handle any errors that can occur during the I/O operations
Introduction (Cont.)
† From the perspective of the RTOS
„ Locating the right device for the I/O request
„ Locating the right device driver for the device
„ Issuing the request to the device driver
„ Ensure synchronized access to the device
„ Facilitate an abstraction that hides both the device
characteristics and specifics from the application
developers
Introduction (Cont.)
† From the perspective of an application
developer
„ The goal is to find a simple, uniform, and elegant
way to communicate with all types of devices
present in the system
„ The application developer is most concerned with
presenting the data to the end user in a useful way
Introduction (Cont.)
† This chapter focuses on
„ basic hardware I/O concepts,
„ the structure of the I/O subsystem, and
„ a specific implementation of an I/O subsystem
12.2 Basic I/O Concepts
† The combination of I/O devices, device drivers, and
the I/O subsystem comprises the overall I/O system
in an embedded environment

† The purpose of the I/O subsystem


„ To hide the device-specific information from the kernel as
well as from the application developer
„ To provide a uniform access method to the peripheral I/O
devices of the system
I/O Subsystem and The Layered
Model
12.2.1 Port-Mapped vs. Memory-
Mapped I/O and DMA
† All I/O devices must be initialized through device
control registers which located on the CPU board or
in the devices themselves
† During operation, the device registers are accessed
again and are programmed to process data transfer
requests
† To access these devices, it is necessary for the
developer to determine if the device is port mapped
or memory mapped
Port-Mapped I/O
The I/O device address space is separate from the system memory address
space, special processor instructions, such as the IN and OUT instructions
offered
Memory-Mapped I/O
The device address is part of the system
memory address space. You can access
by any memory access instructions
DMA I/O
Direct memory access (DMA) chips or controllers allow the device to access the
memory directly without involving the processor
12.2.2 Character-Mode vs. Block-
Mode Devices
† Character-mode devices
„ Allow for unstructured data transfers
„ Data transfers typically take place in serial
fashion (one byte at a time)
„ Simple devices (e.g. serial interface, keypad)
„ The driver buffers the data in cases where the
transfer rate from system to the device is faster
than what the device can handle
Character-Mode vs. Block-Mode
Devices
† Block-mode devices
„ Transfer data one block at time (1,024 bytes per
data transfer)
„ The underlying hardware imposes the block size
„ Some structure must be imposed on the data or
transfer protocol enforced
12.3 The I/O Subsystem
† Each I/O device driver can provide a driver-
specific set of I/O application programming
interfaces to the applications
„ However, each application must be aware of the
nature of the underlying I/O device
† Thus, embedded systems often include an I/O
subsystem to reduce this implementation-
dependence
The I/O Subsystem (Cont.)
† I/O subsystem defines a standard set of
functions for I/O operations
„ To hide device peculiarities from applications

† All I/O device drivers conform to and support


this function set
„ To provide uniform I/O to applications across a
wide spectrum of I/O devices of varying types
I/O Functions
Function Description
Create Creates a virtual instance of an I/O device

Destroy Deletes a virtual instance of an I/O device


Open Prepares an I/O device for use.
Close Communicates to the device that its services are no
longer required, which typically initiates device-specific
cleanup operations.
Read Reads data from an I/O device
Write Writes data into an I/O device
Ioctl Issues control commands to the I/O device (I/O control)
I/O Function Mapping
C Structure Defining the
Uniform I/O API Set
typedef struct
{
int (*Create)( );
int (*Open) ( );
int (*Read)( );
int (*Write) ( );
int (*Close) ( );
int (*Ioctl) ( );
int (*Destroy) ( );
} UNIFORM_IO_DRV;
Mapping Uniform I/O API to
Specific Driver Functions

UNIFORM_IO_DRV ttyIOdrv;
ttyIOdrv.Create = tty_Create;
ttyIOdrv.Open = tty_Open;
ttyIOdrv.Read = tty_Read;
ttyIOdrv.Write = tty_Write;
ttyIOdrv.Close = tty_Close;
ttyIOdrv.Ioctl = tty_Ioctl;
ttyIOdrv.Destroy = tty_Destroy;
Driver Table
† An I/O subsystem usually maintains a
uniform I/O driver table
„ Associate uniform I/O calls with driver-specific
I/O routines
„ A new driver can be installed to or removed from
this driver table
Uniform I/O Driver Table
Associating Devices with Device
Drivers
† The create() function is used to create a
virtual instance of a device
† The I/O subsystem tracks these virtual
instances using the device table
† Each entry in the device table holds generic
information, as well as instance-specific
information
Associating Devices with Device
Drivers (Cont.)
† The generic part can include the unique name
of the device instance and a reference to the
device driver
„ A device instance name is constructed using the
generic device name and the instance number
„ For example, the device named tty0 implies that
† This I/O device is a serial terminal device
† The first instance created in the system
Associating Devices with Device
Drivers (Cont.)
† The driver-dependent part is a block of memory
„ Hold instance-specific data.
„ The content of this information is dependent on the driver
implementation.
„ The driver is the only entity that accesses and interprets
this data.
† A reference to the newly created device entry is
returned to the caller of the create function.
„ Subsequent calls to the open and destroy functions use
this reference.
Associating Devices with Drivers
Points to Remember
† Interfaces between a device and the main processor
occur in two ways: port mapped and memory
mapped
† DMA controllers allows data transfer bypassing the
main processor
† I/O subsystems must be flexible enough to handle a
wide range of I/O devices.
† Uniform I/O hides device peculiarities from
applications.
Points to Remember (Cont.)
† The I/O subsystem maintains a driver table
that associates uniform I/O calls with driver-
specific I/O routines.
† The I/O subsystem maintains a device table
and forms an association between this table
and the driver table

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