1 Booting the Linux/ppc kernel without Open Firmware
2 --------------------------------------------------
4 (c) 2005 Benjamin Herrenschmidt <benh at kernel.crashing.org>,
6 (c) 2005 Becky Bruce <becky.bruce at freescale.com>,
7 Freescale Semiconductor, FSL SOC and 32-bit additions
8 (c) 2006 MontaVista Software, Inc.
9 Flash chip node definition
15 1) Entry point for arch/arm
16 2) Entry point for arch/powerpc
17 3) Entry point for arch/x86
19 II - The DT block format
21 2) Device tree generalities
22 3) Device tree "structure" block
23 4) Device tree "strings" block
25 III - Required content of the device tree
26 1) Note about cells and address representation
27 2) Note about "compatible" properties
28 3) Note about "name" properties
29 4) Note about node and property names and character set
30 5) Required nodes and properties
34 d) the /memory node(s)
36 f) the /soc<SOCname> node
38 IV - "dtc", the device tree compiler
40 V - Recommendations for a bootloader
42 VI - System-on-a-chip devices and nodes
43 1) Defining child nodes of an SOC
44 2) Representing devices without a current OF specification
46 VII - Specifying interrupt information for devices
47 1) interrupts property
48 2) interrupt-parent property
49 3) OpenPIC Interrupt Controllers
50 4) ISA Interrupt Controllers
52 VIII - Specifying device power management information (sleep property)
54 Appendix A - Sample SOC node for MPC8540
60 May 18, 2005: Rev 0.1 - Initial draft, no chapter III yet.
62 May 19, 2005: Rev 0.2 - Add chapter III and bits & pieces here or
63 clarifies the fact that a lot of things are
64 optional, the kernel only requires a very
65 small device tree, though it is encouraged
66 to provide an as complete one as possible.
68 May 24, 2005: Rev 0.3 - Precise that DT block has to be in RAM
70 - Define version 3 and new format version 16
71 for the DT block (version 16 needs kernel
72 patches, will be fwd separately).
73 String block now has a size, and full path
74 is replaced by unit name for more
76 linux,phandle is made optional, only nodes
77 that are referenced by other nodes need it.
78 "name" property is now automatically
79 deduced from the unit name
81 June 1, 2005: Rev 0.4 - Correct confusion between OF_DT_END and
82 OF_DT_END_NODE in structure definition.
83 - Change version 16 format to always align
84 property data to 4 bytes. Since tokens are
85 already aligned, that means no specific
86 required alignment between property size
87 and property data. The old style variable
88 alignment would make it impossible to do
89 "simple" insertion of properties using
90 memmove (thanks Milton for
91 noticing). Updated kernel patch as well
92 - Correct a few more alignment constraints
93 - Add a chapter about the device-tree
94 compiler and the textural representation of
95 the tree that can be "compiled" by dtc.
97 November 21, 2005: Rev 0.5
98 - Additions/generalizations for 32-bit
99 - Changed to reflect the new arch/powerpc
105 - Add some definitions of interrupt tree (simple/complex)
106 - Add some definitions for PCI host bridges
107 - Add some common address format examples
108 - Add definitions for standard properties and "compatible"
109 names for cells that are not already defined by the existing
111 - Compare FSL SOC use of PCI to standard and make sure no new
112 node definition required.
113 - Add more information about node definitions for SOC devices
114 that currently have no standard, like the FSL CPM.
120 During the development of the Linux/ppc64 kernel, and more
121 specifically, the addition of new platform types outside of the old
122 IBM pSeries/iSeries pair, it was decided to enforce some strict rules
123 regarding the kernel entry and bootloader <-> kernel interfaces, in
124 order to avoid the degeneration that had become the ppc32 kernel entry
125 point and the way a new platform should be added to the kernel. The
126 legacy iSeries platform breaks those rules as it predates this scheme,
127 but no new board support will be accepted in the main tree that
128 doesn't follow them properly. In addition, since the advent of the
129 arch/powerpc merged architecture for ppc32 and ppc64, new 32-bit
130 platforms and 32-bit platforms which move into arch/powerpc will be
131 required to use these rules as well.
133 The main requirement that will be defined in more detail below is
134 the presence of a device-tree whose format is defined after Open
135 Firmware specification. However, in order to make life easier
136 to embedded board vendors, the kernel doesn't require the device-tree
137 to represent every device in the system and only requires some nodes
138 and properties to be present. This will be described in detail in
139 section III, but, for example, the kernel does not require you to
140 create a node for every PCI device in the system. It is a requirement
141 to have a node for PCI host bridges in order to provide interrupt
142 routing information and memory/IO ranges, among others. It is also
143 recommended to define nodes for on chip devices and other buses that
144 don't specifically fit in an existing OF specification. This creates a
145 great flexibility in the way the kernel can then probe those and match
146 drivers to device, without having to hard code all sorts of tables. It
147 also makes it more flexible for board vendors to do minor hardware
148 upgrades without significantly impacting the kernel code or cluttering
149 it with special cases.
152 1) Entry point for arch/arm
153 ---------------------------
155 There is one single entry point to the kernel, at the start
156 of the kernel image. That entry point supports two calling
157 conventions. A summary of the interface is described here. A full
158 description of the boot requirements is documented in
159 Documentation/arm/Booting
161 a) ATAGS interface. Minimal information is passed from firmware
162 to the kernel with a tagged list of predefined parameters.
166 r1 : Machine type number
168 r2 : Physical address of tagged list in system RAM
170 b) Entry with a flattened device-tree block. Firmware loads the
171 physical address of the flattened device tree block (dtb) into r2,
172 r1 is not used, but it is considered good practise to use a valid
173 machine number as described in Documentation/arm/Booting.
177 r1 : Valid machine type number. When using a device tree,
178 a single machine type number will often be assigned to
179 represent a class or family of SoCs.
181 r2 : physical pointer to the device-tree block
182 (defined in chapter II) in RAM. Device tree can be located
183 anywhere in system RAM, but it should be aligned on a 64 bit
186 The kernel will differentiate between ATAGS and device tree booting by
187 reading the memory pointed to by r2 and looking for either the flattened
188 device tree block magic value (0xd00dfeed) or the ATAG_CORE value at
189 offset 0x4 from r2 (0x54410001).
191 2) Entry point for arch/powerpc
192 -------------------------------
194 There is one single entry point to the kernel, at the start
195 of the kernel image. That entry point supports two calling
198 a) Boot from Open Firmware. If your firmware is compatible
199 with Open Firmware (IEEE 1275) or provides an OF compatible
200 client interface API (support for "interpret" callback of
201 forth words isn't required), you can enter the kernel with:
203 r5 : OF callback pointer as defined by IEEE 1275
204 bindings to powerpc. Only the 32-bit client interface
205 is currently supported
207 r3, r4 : address & length of an initrd if any or 0
209 The MMU is either on or off; the kernel will run the
210 trampoline located in arch/powerpc/kernel/prom_init.c to
211 extract the device-tree and other information from open
212 firmware and build a flattened device-tree as described
213 in b). prom_init() will then re-enter the kernel using
214 the second method. This trampoline code runs in the
215 context of the firmware, which is supposed to handle all
216 exceptions during that time.
218 b) Direct entry with a flattened device-tree block. This entry
219 point is called by a) after the OF trampoline and can also be
220 called directly by a bootloader that does not support the Open
221 Firmware client interface. It is also used by "kexec" to
222 implement "hot" booting of a new kernel from a previous
223 running one. This method is what I will describe in more
224 details in this document, as method a) is simply standard Open
225 Firmware, and thus should be implemented according to the
226 various standard documents defining it and its binding to the
227 PowerPC platform. The entry point definition then becomes:
229 r3 : physical pointer to the device-tree block
230 (defined in chapter II) in RAM
232 r4 : physical pointer to the kernel itself. This is
233 used by the assembly code to properly disable the MMU
234 in case you are entering the kernel with MMU enabled
235 and a non-1:1 mapping.
237 r5 : NULL (as to differentiate with method a)
239 Note about SMP entry: Either your firmware puts your other
240 CPUs in some sleep loop or spin loop in ROM where you can get
241 them out via a soft reset or some other means, in which case
242 you don't need to care, or you'll have to enter the kernel
243 with all CPUs. The way to do that with method b) will be
244 described in a later revision of this document.
246 Board supports (platforms) are not exclusive config options. An
247 arbitrary set of board supports can be built in a single kernel
248 image. The kernel will "know" what set of functions to use for a
249 given platform based on the content of the device-tree. Thus, you
252 a) add your platform support as a _boolean_ option in
253 arch/powerpc/Kconfig, following the example of PPC_PSERIES,
254 PPC_PMAC and PPC_MAPLE. The later is probably a good
255 example of a board support to start from.
257 b) create your main platform file as
258 "arch/powerpc/platforms/myplatform/myboard_setup.c" and add it
259 to the Makefile under the condition of your CONFIG_
260 option. This file will define a structure of type "ppc_md"
261 containing the various callbacks that the generic code will
262 use to get to your platform specific code
264 A kernel image may support multiple platforms, but only if the
265 platforms feature the same core architecture. A single kernel build
266 cannot support both configurations with Book E and configurations
267 with classic Powerpc architectures.
269 3) Entry point for arch/x86
270 -------------------------------
272 There is one single 32bit entry point to the kernel at code32_start,
273 the decompressor (the real mode entry point goes to the same 32bit
274 entry point once it switched into protected mode). That entry point
275 supports one calling convention which is documented in
276 Documentation/x86/boot.txt
277 The physical pointer to the device-tree block (defined in chapter II)
278 is passed via setup_data which requires at least boot protocol 2.09.
279 The type filed is defined as
283 This device-tree is used as an extension to the "boot page". As such it
284 does not parse / consider data which is already covered by the boot
285 page. This includes memory size, reserved ranges, command line arguments
286 or initrd address. It simply holds information which can not be retrieved
287 otherwise like interrupt routing or a list of devices behind an I2C bus.
289 II - The DT block format
290 ========================
293 This chapter defines the actual format of the flattened device-tree
294 passed to the kernel. The actual content of it and kernel requirements
295 are described later. You can find example of code manipulating that
296 format in various places, including arch/powerpc/kernel/prom_init.c
297 which will generate a flattened device-tree from the Open Firmware
298 representation, or the fs2dt utility which is part of the kexec tools
299 which will generate one from a filesystem representation. It is
300 expected that a bootloader like uboot provides a bit more support,
301 that will be discussed later as well.
303 Note: The block has to be in main memory. It has to be accessible in
304 both real mode and virtual mode with no mapping other than main
305 memory. If you are writing a simple flash bootloader, it should copy
306 the block to RAM before passing it to the kernel.
312 The kernel is passed the physical address pointing to an area of memory
313 that is roughly described in include/linux/of_fdt.h by the structure
316 struct boot_param_header {
317 u32 magic; /* magic word OF_DT_HEADER */
318 u32 totalsize; /* total size of DT block */
319 u32 off_dt_struct; /* offset to structure */
320 u32 off_dt_strings; /* offset to strings */
321 u32 off_mem_rsvmap; /* offset to memory reserve map
323 u32 version; /* format version */
324 u32 last_comp_version; /* last compatible version */
326 /* version 2 fields below */
327 u32 boot_cpuid_phys; /* Which physical CPU id we're
329 /* version 3 fields below */
330 u32 size_dt_strings; /* size of the strings block */
332 /* version 17 fields below */
333 u32 size_dt_struct; /* size of the DT structure block */
336 Along with the constants:
338 /* Definitions used by the flattened device tree */
339 #define OF_DT_HEADER 0xd00dfeed /* 4: version,
341 #define OF_DT_BEGIN_NODE 0x1 /* Start node: full name
343 #define OF_DT_END_NODE 0x2 /* End node */
344 #define OF_DT_PROP 0x3 /* Property: name off,
346 #define OF_DT_END 0x9
348 All values in this header are in big endian format, the various
349 fields in this header are defined more precisely below. All
350 "offset" values are in bytes from the start of the header; that is
351 from the physical base address of the device tree block.
355 This is a magic value that "marks" the beginning of the
356 device-tree block header. It contains the value 0xd00dfeed and is
357 defined by the constant OF_DT_HEADER
361 This is the total size of the DT block including the header. The
362 "DT" block should enclose all data structures defined in this
363 chapter (who are pointed to by offsets in this header). That is,
364 the device-tree structure, strings, and the memory reserve map.
368 This is an offset from the beginning of the header to the start
369 of the "structure" part the device tree. (see 2) device tree)
373 This is an offset from the beginning of the header to the start
374 of the "strings" part of the device-tree
378 This is an offset from the beginning of the header to the start
379 of the reserved memory map. This map is a list of pairs of 64-
380 bit integers. Each pair is a physical address and a size. The
381 list is terminated by an entry of size 0. This map provides the
382 kernel with a list of physical memory areas that are "reserved"
383 and thus not to be used for memory allocations, especially during
384 early initialization. The kernel needs to allocate memory during
385 boot for things like un-flattening the device-tree, allocating an
386 MMU hash table, etc... Those allocations must be done in such a
387 way to avoid overriding critical things like, on Open Firmware
388 capable machines, the RTAS instance, or on some pSeries, the TCE
389 tables used for the iommu. Typically, the reserve map should
390 contain _at least_ this DT block itself (header,total_size). If
391 you are passing an initrd to the kernel, you should reserve it as
392 well. You do not need to reserve the kernel image itself. The map
393 should be 64-bit aligned.
397 This is the version of this structure. Version 1 stops
398 here. Version 2 adds an additional field boot_cpuid_phys.
399 Version 3 adds the size of the strings block, allowing the kernel
400 to reallocate it easily at boot and free up the unused flattened
401 structure after expansion. Version 16 introduces a new more
402 "compact" format for the tree itself that is however not backward
403 compatible. Version 17 adds an additional field, size_dt_struct,
404 allowing it to be reallocated or moved more easily (this is
405 particularly useful for bootloaders which need to make
406 adjustments to a device tree based on probed information). You
407 should always generate a structure of the highest version defined
408 at the time of your implementation. Currently that is version 17,
409 unless you explicitly aim at being backward compatible.
413 Last compatible version. This indicates down to what version of
414 the DT block you are backward compatible. For example, version 2
415 is backward compatible with version 1 (that is, a kernel build
416 for version 1 will be able to boot with a version 2 format). You
417 should put a 1 in this field if you generate a device tree of
418 version 1 to 3, or 16 if you generate a tree of version 16 or 17
419 using the new unit name format.
423 This field only exist on version 2 headers. It indicate which
424 physical CPU ID is calling the kernel entry point. This is used,
425 among others, by kexec. If you are on an SMP system, this value
426 should match the content of the "reg" property of the CPU node in
427 the device-tree corresponding to the CPU calling the kernel entry
428 point (see further chapters for more information on the required
429 device-tree contents)
433 This field only exists on version 3 and later headers. It
434 gives the size of the "strings" section of the device tree (which
435 starts at the offset given by off_dt_strings).
439 This field only exists on version 17 and later headers. It gives
440 the size of the "structure" section of the device tree (which
441 starts at the offset given by off_dt_struct).
443 So the typical layout of a DT block (though the various parts don't
444 need to be in that order) looks like this (addresses go from top to
448 ------------------------------
449 base -> | struct boot_param_header |
450 ------------------------------
451 | (alignment gap) (*) |
452 ------------------------------
453 | memory reserve map |
454 ------------------------------
456 ------------------------------
458 | device-tree structure |
460 ------------------------------
462 ------------------------------
464 | device-tree strings |
466 -----> ------------------------------
469 --- (base + totalsize)
471 (*) The alignment gaps are not necessarily present; their presence
472 and size are dependent on the various alignment requirements of
473 the individual data blocks.
476 2) Device tree generalities
477 ---------------------------
479 This device-tree itself is separated in two different blocks, a
480 structure block and a strings block. Both need to be aligned to a 4
483 First, let's quickly describe the device-tree concept before detailing
484 the storage format. This chapter does _not_ describe the detail of the
485 required types of nodes & properties for the kernel, this is done
486 later in chapter III.
488 The device-tree layout is strongly inherited from the definition of
489 the Open Firmware IEEE 1275 device-tree. It's basically a tree of
490 nodes, each node having two or more named properties. A property can
493 It is a tree, so each node has one and only one parent except for the
494 root node who has no parent.
496 A node has 2 names. The actual node name is generally contained in a
497 property of type "name" in the node property list whose value is a
498 zero terminated string and is mandatory for version 1 to 3 of the
499 format definition (as it is in Open Firmware). Version 16 makes it
500 optional as it can generate it from the unit name defined below.
502 There is also a "unit name" that is used to differentiate nodes with
503 the same name at the same level, it is usually made of the node
504 names, the "@" sign, and a "unit address", which definition is
505 specific to the bus type the node sits on.
507 The unit name doesn't exist as a property per-se but is included in
508 the device-tree structure. It is typically used to represent "path" in
509 the device-tree. More details about the actual format of these will be
512 The kernel generic code does not make any formal use of the
513 unit address (though some board support code may do) so the only real
514 requirement here for the unit address is to ensure uniqueness of
515 the node unit name at a given level of the tree. Nodes with no notion
516 of address and no possible sibling of the same name (like /memory or
517 /cpus) may omit the unit address in the context of this specification,
518 or use the "@0" default unit address. The unit name is used to define
519 a node "full path", which is the concatenation of all parent node
520 unit names separated with "/".
522 The root node doesn't have a defined name, and isn't required to have
523 a name property either if you are using version 3 or earlier of the
524 format. It also has no unit address (no @ symbol followed by a unit
525 address). The root node unit name is thus an empty string. The full
526 path to the root node is "/".
528 Every node which actually represents an actual device (that is, a node
529 which isn't only a virtual "container" for more nodes, like "/cpus"
530 is) is also required to have a "compatible" property indicating the
531 specific hardware and an optional list of devices it is fully
532 backwards compatible with.
534 Finally, every node that can be referenced from a property in another
535 node is required to have either a "phandle" or a "linux,phandle"
536 property. Real Open Firmware implementations provide a unique
537 "phandle" value for every node that the "prom_init()" trampoline code
538 turns into "linux,phandle" properties. However, this is made optional
539 if the flattened device tree is used directly. An example of a node
540 referencing another node via "phandle" is when laying out the
541 interrupt tree which will be described in a further version of this
544 The "phandle" property is a 32-bit value that uniquely
545 identifies a node. You are free to use whatever values or system of
546 values, internal pointers, or whatever to generate these, the only
547 requirement is that every node for which you provide that property has
548 a unique value for it.
550 Here is an example of a simple device-tree. In this example, an "o"
551 designates a node followed by the node unit name. Properties are
552 presented with their name followed by their content. "content"
553 represents an ASCII string (zero terminated) value, while <content>
554 represents a 32-bit hexadecimal value. The various nodes in this
555 example will be discussed in a later chapter. At this point, it is
556 only meant to give you a idea of what a device-tree looks like. I have
557 purposefully kept the "name" and "linux,phandle" properties which
558 aren't necessary in order to give you a better idea of what the tree
559 looks like in practice.
562 |- name = "device-tree"
563 |- model = "MyBoardName"
564 |- compatible = "MyBoardFamilyName"
565 |- #address-cells = <2>
567 |- linux,phandle = <0>
571 | | - linux,phandle = <1>
572 | | - #address-cells = <1>
573 | | - #size-cells = <0>
576 | |- name = "PowerPC,970"
577 | |- device_type = "cpu"
579 | |- clock-frequency = <5f5e1000>
581 | |- linux,phandle = <2>
585 | |- device_type = "memory"
586 | |- reg = <00000000 00000000 00000000 20000000>
587 | |- linux,phandle = <3>
591 |- bootargs = "root=/dev/sda2"
592 |- linux,phandle = <4>
594 This tree is almost a minimal tree. It pretty much contains the
595 minimal set of required nodes and properties to boot a linux kernel;
596 that is, some basic model information at the root, the CPUs, and the
597 physical memory layout. It also includes misc information passed
598 through /chosen, like in this example, the platform type (mandatory)
599 and the kernel command line arguments (optional).
601 The /cpus/PowerPC,970@0/64-bit property is an example of a
602 property without a value. All other properties have a value. The
603 significance of the #address-cells and #size-cells properties will be
604 explained in chapter IV which defines precisely the required nodes and
605 properties and their content.
608 3) Device tree "structure" block
610 The structure of the device tree is a linearized tree structure. The
611 "OF_DT_BEGIN_NODE" token starts a new node, and the "OF_DT_END_NODE"
612 ends that node definition. Child nodes are simply defined before
613 "OF_DT_END_NODE" (that is nodes within the node). A 'token' is a 32
614 bit value. The tree has to be "finished" with a OF_DT_END token
616 Here's the basic structure of a single node:
618 * token OF_DT_BEGIN_NODE (that is 0x00000001)
619 * for version 1 to 3, this is the node full path as a zero
620 terminated string, starting with "/". For version 16 and later,
621 this is the node unit name only (or an empty string for the
623 * [align gap to next 4 bytes boundary]
625 * token OF_DT_PROP (that is 0x00000003)
626 * 32-bit value of property value size in bytes (or 0 if no
628 * 32-bit value of offset in string block of property name
629 * property value data if any
630 * [align gap to next 4 bytes boundary]
631 * [child nodes if any]
632 * token OF_DT_END_NODE (that is 0x00000002)
634 So the node content can be summarized as a start token, a full path,
635 a list of properties, a list of child nodes, and an end token. Every
636 child node is a full node structure itself as defined above.
638 NOTE: The above definition requires that all property definitions for
639 a particular node MUST precede any subnode definitions for that node.
640 Although the structure would not be ambiguous if properties and
641 subnodes were intermingled, the kernel parser requires that the
642 properties come first (up until at least 2.6.22). Any tools
643 manipulating a flattened tree must take care to preserve this
646 4) Device tree "strings" block
648 In order to save space, property names, which are generally redundant,
649 are stored separately in the "strings" block. This block is simply the
650 whole bunch of zero terminated strings for all property names
651 concatenated together. The device-tree property definitions in the
652 structure block will contain offset values from the beginning of the
656 III - Required content of the device tree
657 =========================================
659 WARNING: All "linux,*" properties defined in this document apply only
660 to a flattened device-tree. If your platform uses a real
661 implementation of Open Firmware or an implementation compatible with
662 the Open Firmware client interface, those properties will be created
663 by the trampoline code in the kernel's prom_init() file. For example,
664 that's where you'll have to add code to detect your board model and
665 set the platform number. However, when using the flattened device-tree
666 entry point, there is no prom_init() pass, and thus you have to
667 provide those properties yourself.
670 1) Note about cells and address representation
671 ----------------------------------------------
673 The general rule is documented in the various Open Firmware
674 documentations. If you choose to describe a bus with the device-tree
675 and there exist an OF bus binding, then you should follow the
676 specification. However, the kernel does not require every single
677 device or bus to be described by the device tree.
679 In general, the format of an address for a device is defined by the
680 parent bus type, based on the #address-cells and #size-cells
681 properties. Note that the parent's parent definitions of #address-cells
682 and #size-cells are not inherited so every node with children must specify
683 them. The kernel requires the root node to have those properties defining
684 addresses format for devices directly mapped on the processor bus.
686 Those 2 properties define 'cells' for representing an address and a
687 size. A "cell" is a 32-bit number. For example, if both contain 2
688 like the example tree given above, then an address and a size are both
689 composed of 2 cells, and each is a 64-bit number (cells are
690 concatenated and expected to be in big endian format). Another example
691 is the way Apple firmware defines them, with 2 cells for an address
692 and one cell for a size. Most 32-bit implementations should define
693 #address-cells and #size-cells to 1, which represents a 32-bit value.
694 Some 32-bit processors allow for physical addresses greater than 32
695 bits; these processors should define #address-cells as 2.
697 "reg" properties are always a tuple of the type "address size" where
698 the number of cells of address and size is specified by the bus
699 #address-cells and #size-cells. When a bus supports various address
700 spaces and other flags relative to a given address allocation (like
701 prefetchable, etc...) those flags are usually added to the top level
702 bits of the physical address. For example, a PCI physical address is
703 made of 3 cells, the bottom two containing the actual address itself
704 while the top cell contains address space indication, flags, and pci
705 bus & device numbers.
707 For buses that support dynamic allocation, it's the accepted practice
708 to then not provide the address in "reg" (keep it 0) though while
709 providing a flag indicating the address is dynamically allocated, and
710 then, to provide a separate "assigned-addresses" property that
711 contains the fully allocated addresses. See the PCI OF bindings for
714 In general, a simple bus with no address space bits and no dynamic
715 allocation is preferred if it reflects your hardware, as the existing
716 kernel address parsing functions will work out of the box. If you
717 define a bus type with a more complex address format, including things
718 like address space bits, you'll have to add a bus translator to the
719 prom_parse.c file of the recent kernels for your bus type.
721 The "reg" property only defines addresses and sizes (if #size-cells is
722 non-0) within a given bus. In order to translate addresses upward
723 (that is into parent bus addresses, and possibly into CPU physical
724 addresses), all buses must contain a "ranges" property. If the
725 "ranges" property is missing at a given level, it's assumed that
726 translation isn't possible, i.e., the registers are not visible on the
727 parent bus. The format of the "ranges" property for a bus is a list
730 bus address, parent bus address, size
732 "bus address" is in the format of the bus this bus node is defining,
733 that is, for a PCI bridge, it would be a PCI address. Thus, (bus
734 address, size) defines a range of addresses for child devices. "parent
735 bus address" is in the format of the parent bus of this bus. For
736 example, for a PCI host controller, that would be a CPU address. For a
737 PCI<->ISA bridge, that would be a PCI address. It defines the base
738 address in the parent bus where the beginning of that range is mapped.
740 For new 64-bit board support, I recommend either the 2/2 format or
741 Apple's 2/1 format which is slightly more compact since sizes usually
742 fit in a single 32-bit word. New 32-bit board support should use a
743 1/1 format, unless the processor supports physical addresses greater
744 than 32-bits, in which case a 2/1 format is recommended.
746 Alternatively, the "ranges" property may be empty, indicating that the
747 registers are visible on the parent bus using an identity mapping
748 translation. In other words, the parent bus address space is the same
749 as the child bus address space.
751 2) Note about "compatible" properties
752 -------------------------------------
754 These properties are optional, but recommended in devices and the root
755 node. The format of a "compatible" property is a list of concatenated
756 zero terminated strings. They allow a device to express its
757 compatibility with a family of similar devices, in some cases,
758 allowing a single driver to match against several devices regardless
759 of their actual names.
761 3) Note about "name" properties
762 -------------------------------
764 While earlier users of Open Firmware like OldWorld macintoshes tended
765 to use the actual device name for the "name" property, it's nowadays
766 considered a good practice to use a name that is closer to the device
767 class (often equal to device_type). For example, nowadays, Ethernet
768 controllers are named "ethernet", an additional "model" property
769 defining precisely the chip type/model, and "compatible" property
770 defining the family in case a single driver can driver more than one
771 of these chips. However, the kernel doesn't generally put any
772 restriction on the "name" property; it is simply considered good
773 practice to follow the standard and its evolutions as closely as
776 Note also that the new format version 16 makes the "name" property
777 optional. If it's absent for a node, then the node's unit name is then
778 used to reconstruct the name. That is, the part of the unit name
779 before the "@" sign is used (or the entire unit name if no "@" sign
782 4) Note about node and property names and character set
783 -------------------------------------------------------
785 While Open Firmware provides more flexible usage of 8859-1, this
786 specification enforces more strict rules. Nodes and properties should
787 be comprised only of ASCII characters 'a' to 'z', '0' to
788 '9', ',', '.', '_', '+', '#', '?', and '-'. Node names additionally
789 allow uppercase characters 'A' to 'Z' (property names should be
790 lowercase. The fact that vendors like Apple don't respect this rule is
791 irrelevant here). Additionally, node and property names should always
792 begin with a character in the range 'a' to 'z' (or 'A' to 'Z' for node
795 The maximum number of characters for both nodes and property names
796 is 31. In the case of node names, this is only the leftmost part of
797 a unit name (the pure "name" property), it doesn't include the unit
798 address which can extend beyond that limit.
801 5) Required nodes and properties
802 --------------------------------
803 These are all that are currently required. However, it is strongly
804 recommended that you expose PCI host bridges as documented in the
805 PCI binding to Open Firmware, and your interrupt tree as documented
806 in OF interrupt tree specification.
810 The root node requires some properties to be present:
812 - model : this is your board name/model
813 - #address-cells : address representation for "root" devices
814 - #size-cells: the size representation for "root" devices
815 - compatible : the board "family" generally finds its way here,
816 for example, if you have 2 board models with a similar layout,
817 that typically get driven by the same platform code in the
818 kernel, you would specify the exact board model in the
819 compatible property followed by an entry that represents the SoC
822 The root node is also generally where you add additional properties
823 specific to your board like the serial number if any, that sort of
824 thing. It is recommended that if you add any "custom" property whose
825 name may clash with standard defined ones, you prefix them with your
826 vendor name and a comma.
830 This node is the parent of all individual CPU nodes. It doesn't
831 have any specific requirements, though it's generally good practice
834 #address-cells = <00000001>
835 #size-cells = <00000000>
837 This defines that the "address" for a CPU is a single cell, and has
838 no meaningful size. This is not necessary but the kernel will assume
839 that format when reading the "reg" properties of a CPU node, see
844 So under /cpus, you are supposed to create a node for every CPU on
845 the machine. There is no specific restriction on the name of the
846 CPU, though it's common to call it <architecture>,<core>. For
847 example, Apple uses PowerPC,G5 while IBM uses PowerPC,970FX.
848 However, the Generic Names convention suggests that it would be
849 better to simply use 'cpu' for each cpu node and use the compatible
850 property to identify the specific cpu core.
854 - device_type : has to be "cpu"
855 - reg : This is the physical CPU number, it's a single 32-bit cell
856 and is also used as-is as the unit number for constructing the
857 unit name in the full path. For example, with 2 CPUs, you would
859 /cpus/PowerPC,970FX@0
860 /cpus/PowerPC,970FX@1
861 (unit addresses do not require leading zeroes)
862 - d-cache-block-size : one cell, L1 data cache block size in bytes (*)
863 - i-cache-block-size : one cell, L1 instruction cache block size in
865 - d-cache-size : one cell, size of L1 data cache in bytes
866 - i-cache-size : one cell, size of L1 instruction cache in bytes
868 (*) The cache "block" size is the size on which the cache management
869 instructions operate. Historically, this document used the cache
870 "line" size here which is incorrect. The kernel will prefer the cache
871 block size and will fallback to cache line size for backward
874 Recommended properties:
876 - timebase-frequency : a cell indicating the frequency of the
877 timebase in Hz. This is not directly used by the generic code,
878 but you are welcome to copy/paste the pSeries code for setting
879 the kernel timebase/decrementer calibration based on this
881 - clock-frequency : a cell indicating the CPU core clock frequency
882 in Hz. A new property will be defined for 64-bit values, but if
883 your frequency is < 4Ghz, one cell is enough. Here as well as
884 for the above, the common code doesn't use that property, but
885 you are welcome to re-use the pSeries or Maple one. A future
886 kernel version might provide a common function for this.
887 - d-cache-line-size : one cell, L1 data cache line size in bytes
888 if different from the block size
889 - i-cache-line-size : one cell, L1 instruction cache line size in
890 bytes if different from the block size
892 You are welcome to add any property you find relevant to your board,
893 like some information about the mechanism used to soft-reset the
894 CPUs. For example, Apple puts the GPIO number for CPU soft reset
895 lines in there as a "soft-reset" property since they start secondary
896 CPUs by soft-resetting them.
899 d) the /memory node(s)
901 To define the physical memory layout of your board, you should
902 create one or more memory node(s). You can either create a single
903 node with all memory ranges in its reg property, or you can create
904 several nodes, as you wish. The unit address (@ part) used for the
905 full path is the address of the first range of memory defined by a
906 given node. If you use a single memory node, this will typically be
911 - device_type : has to be "memory"
912 - reg : This property contains all the physical memory ranges of
913 your board. It's a list of addresses/sizes concatenated
914 together, with the number of cells of each defined by the
915 #address-cells and #size-cells of the root node. For example,
916 with both of these properties being 2 like in the example given
917 earlier, a 970 based machine with 6Gb of RAM could typically
918 have a "reg" property here that looks like:
920 00000000 00000000 00000000 80000000
921 00000001 00000000 00000001 00000000
923 That is a range starting at 0 of 0x80000000 bytes and a range
924 starting at 0x100000000 and of 0x100000000 bytes. You can see
925 that there is no memory covering the IO hole between 2Gb and
926 4Gb. Some vendors prefer splitting those ranges into smaller
927 segments, but the kernel doesn't care.
931 This node is a bit "special". Normally, that's where Open Firmware
932 puts some variable environment information, like the arguments, or
933 the default input/output devices.
935 This specification makes a few of these mandatory, but also defines
936 some linux-specific properties that would be normally constructed by
937 the prom_init() trampoline when booting with an OF client interface,
938 but that you have to provide yourself when using the flattened format.
940 Recommended properties:
942 - bootargs : This zero-terminated string is passed as the kernel
944 - linux,stdout-path : This is the full path to your standard
945 console device if any. Typically, if you have serial devices on
946 your board, you may want to put the full path to the one set as
947 the default console in the firmware here, for the kernel to pick
948 it up as its own default console.
950 Note that u-boot creates and fills in the chosen node for platforms
953 (Note: a practice that is now obsolete was to include a property
954 under /chosen called interrupt-controller which had a phandle value
955 that pointed to the main interrupt controller)
957 f) the /soc<SOCname> node
959 This node is used to represent a system-on-a-chip (SoC) and must be
960 present if the processor is a SoC. The top-level soc node contains
961 information that is global to all devices on the SoC. The node name
962 should contain a unit address for the SoC, which is the base address
963 of the memory-mapped register set for the SoC. The name of an SoC
964 node should start with "soc", and the remainder of the name should
965 represent the part number for the soc. For example, the MPC8540's
966 soc node would be called "soc8540".
970 - ranges : Should be defined as specified in 1) to describe the
971 translation of SoC addresses for memory mapped SoC registers.
972 - bus-frequency: Contains the bus frequency for the SoC node.
973 Typically, the value of this field is filled in by the boot
975 - compatible : Exact model of the SoC
978 Recommended properties:
980 - reg : This property defines the address and size of the
981 memory-mapped registers that are used for the SOC node itself.
982 It does not include the child device registers - these will be
983 defined inside each child node. The address specified in the
984 "reg" property should match the unit address of the SOC node.
985 - #address-cells : Address representation for "soc" devices. The
986 format of this field may vary depending on whether or not the
987 device registers are memory mapped. For memory mapped
988 registers, this field represents the number of cells needed to
989 represent the address of the registers. For SOCs that do not
990 use MMIO, a special address format should be defined that
991 contains enough cells to represent the required information.
992 See 1) above for more details on defining #address-cells.
993 - #size-cells : Size representation for "soc" devices
994 - #interrupt-cells : Defines the width of cells used to represent
995 interrupts. Typically this value is <2>, which includes a
996 32-bit number that represents the interrupt number, and a
997 32-bit number that represents the interrupt sense and level.
998 This field is only needed if the SOC contains an interrupt
1001 The SOC node may contain child nodes for each SOC device that the
1002 platform uses. Nodes should not be created for devices which exist
1003 on the SOC but are not used by a particular platform. See chapter VI
1004 for more information on how to specify devices that are part of a SOC.
1006 Example SOC node for the MPC8540:
1009 #address-cells = <1>;
1011 #interrupt-cells = <2>;
1012 device_type = "soc";
1013 ranges = <00000000 e0000000 00100000>
1014 reg = <e0000000 00003000>;
1015 bus-frequency = <0>;
1020 IV - "dtc", the device tree compiler
1021 ====================================
1024 dtc source code can be found at
1025 <http://git.jdl.com/gitweb/?p=dtc.git>
1027 WARNING: This version is still in early development stage; the
1028 resulting device-tree "blobs" have not yet been validated with the
1029 kernel. The current generated block lacks a useful reserve map (it will
1030 be fixed to generate an empty one, it's up to the bootloader to fill
1031 it up) among others. The error handling needs work, bugs are lurking,
1034 dtc basically takes a device-tree in a given format and outputs a
1035 device-tree in another format. The currently supported formats are:
1040 - "dtb": "blob" format, that is a flattened device-tree block
1042 header all in a binary blob.
1043 - "dts": "source" format. This is a text file containing a
1044 "source" for a device-tree. The format is defined later in this
1046 - "fs" format. This is a representation equivalent to the
1047 output of /proc/device-tree, that is nodes are directories and
1048 properties are files
1053 - "dtb": "blob" format
1054 - "dts": "source" format
1055 - "asm": assembly language file. This is a file that can be
1056 sourced by gas to generate a device-tree "blob". That file can
1057 then simply be added to your Makefile. Additionally, the
1058 assembly file exports some symbols that can be used.
1061 The syntax of the dtc tool is
1063 dtc [-I <input-format>] [-O <output-format>]
1064 [-o output-filename] [-V output_version] input_filename
1067 The "output_version" defines what version of the "blob" format will be
1068 generated. Supported versions are 1,2,3 and 16. The default is
1069 currently version 3 but that may change in the future to version 16.
1071 Additionally, dtc performs various sanity checks on the tree, like the
1072 uniqueness of linux, phandle properties, validity of strings, etc...
1074 The format of the .dts "source" file is "C" like, supports C and C++
1080 The above is the "device-tree" definition. It's the only statement
1081 supported currently at the toplevel.
1084 property1 = "string_value"; /* define a property containing a 0
1088 property2 = <1234abcd>; /* define a property containing a
1089 * numerical 32-bit value (hexadecimal)
1092 property3 = <12345678 12345678 deadbeef>;
1093 /* define a property containing 3
1094 * numerical 32-bit values (cells) in
1097 property4 = [0a 0b 0c 0d de ea ad be ef];
1098 /* define a property whose content is
1099 * an arbitrary array of bytes
1102 childnode@address { /* define a child node named "childnode"
1103 * whose unit name is "childnode at
1107 childprop = "hello\n"; /* define a property "childprop" of
1108 * childnode (in this case, a string)
1113 Nodes can contain other nodes etc... thus defining the hierarchical
1114 structure of the tree.
1116 Strings support common escape sequences from C: "\n", "\t", "\r",
1117 "\(octal value)", "\x(hex value)".
1119 It is also suggested that you pipe your source file through cpp (gcc
1120 preprocessor) so you can use #include's, #define for constants, etc...
1122 Finally, various options are planned but not yet implemented, like
1123 automatic generation of phandles, labels (exported to the asm file so
1124 you can point to a property content and change it easily from whatever
1125 you link the device-tree with), label or path instead of numeric value
1126 in some cells to "point" to a node (replaced by a phandle at compile
1127 time), export of reserve map address to the asm file, ability to
1128 specify reserve map content at compile time, etc...
1130 We may provide a .h include file with common definitions of that
1131 proves useful for some properties (like building PCI properties or
1132 interrupt maps) though it may be better to add a notion of struct
1133 definitions to the compiler...
1136 V - Recommendations for a bootloader
1137 ====================================
1140 Here are some various ideas/recommendations that have been proposed
1141 while all this has been defined and implemented.
1143 - The bootloader may want to be able to use the device-tree itself
1144 and may want to manipulate it (to add/edit some properties,
1145 like physical memory size or kernel arguments). At this point, 2
1146 choices can be made. Either the bootloader works directly on the
1147 flattened format, or the bootloader has its own internal tree
1148 representation with pointers (similar to the kernel one) and
1149 re-flattens the tree when booting the kernel. The former is a bit
1150 more difficult to edit/modify, the later requires probably a bit
1151 more code to handle the tree structure. Note that the structure
1152 format has been designed so it's relatively easy to "insert"
1153 properties or nodes or delete them by just memmoving things
1154 around. It contains no internal offsets or pointers for this
1157 - An example of code for iterating nodes & retrieving properties
1158 directly from the flattened tree format can be found in the kernel
1159 file drivers/of/fdt.c. Look at the of_scan_flat_dt() function,
1160 its usage in early_init_devtree(), and the corresponding various
1161 early_init_dt_scan_*() callbacks. That code can be re-used in a
1162 GPL bootloader, and as the author of that code, I would be happy
1163 to discuss possible free licensing to any vendor who wishes to
1164 integrate all or part of this code into a non-GPL bootloader.
1165 (reference needed; who is 'I' here? ---gcl Jan 31, 2011)
1169 VI - System-on-a-chip devices and nodes
1170 =======================================
1172 Many companies are now starting to develop system-on-a-chip
1173 processors, where the processor core (CPU) and many peripheral devices
1174 exist on a single piece of silicon. For these SOCs, an SOC node
1175 should be used that defines child nodes for the devices that make
1176 up the SOC. While platforms are not required to use this model in
1177 order to boot the kernel, it is highly encouraged that all SOC
1178 implementations define as complete a flat-device-tree as possible to
1179 describe the devices on the SOC. This will allow for the
1180 genericization of much of the kernel code.
1183 1) Defining child nodes of an SOC
1184 ---------------------------------
1186 Each device that is part of an SOC may have its own node entry inside
1187 the SOC node. For each device that is included in the SOC, the unit
1188 address property represents the address offset for this device's
1189 memory-mapped registers in the parent's address space. The parent's
1190 address space is defined by the "ranges" property in the top-level soc
1191 node. The "reg" property for each node that exists directly under the
1192 SOC node should contain the address mapping from the child address space
1193 to the parent SOC address space and the size of the device's
1194 memory-mapped register file.
1196 For many devices that may exist inside an SOC, there are predefined
1197 specifications for the format of the device tree node. All SOC child
1198 nodes should follow these specifications, except where noted in this
1201 See appendix A for an example partial SOC node definition for the
1205 2) Representing devices without a current OF specification
1206 ----------------------------------------------------------
1208 Currently, there are many devices on SoCs that do not have a standard
1209 representation defined as part of the Open Firmware specifications,
1210 mainly because the boards that contain these SoCs are not currently
1211 booted using Open Firmware. Binding documentation for new devices
1212 should be added to the Documentation/devicetree/bindings directory.
1213 That directory will expand as device tree support is added to more and
1217 VII - Specifying interrupt information for devices
1218 ===================================================
1220 The device tree represents the buses and devices of a hardware
1221 system in a form similar to the physical bus topology of the
1224 In addition, a logical 'interrupt tree' exists which represents the
1225 hierarchy and routing of interrupts in the hardware.
1227 The interrupt tree model is fully described in the
1228 document "Open Firmware Recommended Practice: Interrupt
1229 Mapping Version 0.9". The document is available at:
1230 <http://playground.sun.com/1275/practice>.
1232 1) interrupts property
1233 ----------------------
1235 Devices that generate interrupts to a single interrupt controller
1236 should use the conventional OF representation described in the
1237 OF interrupt mapping documentation.
1239 Each device which generates interrupts must have an 'interrupt'
1240 property. The interrupt property value is an arbitrary number of
1241 of 'interrupt specifier' values which describe the interrupt or
1242 interrupts for the device.
1244 The encoding of an interrupt specifier is determined by the
1245 interrupt domain in which the device is located in the
1246 interrupt tree. The root of an interrupt domain specifies in
1247 its #interrupt-cells property the number of 32-bit cells
1248 required to encode an interrupt specifier. See the OF interrupt
1249 mapping documentation for a detailed description of domains.
1251 For example, the binding for the OpenPIC interrupt controller
1252 specifies an #interrupt-cells value of 2 to encode the interrupt
1253 number and level/sense information. All interrupt children in an
1254 OpenPIC interrupt domain use 2 cells per interrupt in their interrupts
1257 The PCI bus binding specifies a #interrupt-cell value of 1 to encode
1258 which interrupt pin (INTA,INTB,INTC,INTD) is used.
1260 2) interrupt-parent property
1261 ----------------------------
1263 The interrupt-parent property is specified to define an explicit
1264 link between a device node and its interrupt parent in
1265 the interrupt tree. The value of interrupt-parent is the
1266 phandle of the parent node.
1268 If the interrupt-parent property is not defined for a node, its
1269 interrupt parent is assumed to be an ancestor in the node's
1270 _device tree_ hierarchy.
1272 3) OpenPIC Interrupt Controllers
1273 --------------------------------
1275 OpenPIC interrupt controllers require 2 cells to encode
1276 interrupt information. The first cell defines the interrupt
1277 number. The second cell defines the sense and level
1280 Sense and level information should be encoded as follows:
1282 0 = low to high edge sensitive type enabled
1283 1 = active low level sensitive type enabled
1284 2 = active high level sensitive type enabled
1285 3 = high to low edge sensitive type enabled
1287 4) ISA Interrupt Controllers
1288 ----------------------------
1290 ISA PIC interrupt controllers require 2 cells to encode
1291 interrupt information. The first cell defines the interrupt
1292 number. The second cell defines the sense and level
1295 ISA PIC interrupt controllers should adhere to the ISA PIC
1296 encodings listed below:
1298 0 = active low level sensitive type enabled
1299 1 = active high level sensitive type enabled
1300 2 = high to low edge sensitive type enabled
1301 3 = low to high edge sensitive type enabled
1303 VIII - Specifying Device Power Management Information (sleep property)
1304 ===================================================================
1306 Devices on SOCs often have mechanisms for placing devices into low-power
1307 states that are decoupled from the devices' own register blocks. Sometimes,
1308 this information is more complicated than a cell-index property can
1309 reasonably describe. Thus, each device controlled in such a manner
1310 may contain a "sleep" property which describes these connections.
1312 The sleep property consists of one or more sleep resources, each of
1313 which consists of a phandle to a sleep controller, followed by a
1314 controller-specific sleep specifier of zero or more cells.
1316 The semantics of what type of low power modes are possible are defined
1317 by the sleep controller. Some examples of the types of low power modes
1318 that may be supported are:
1320 - Dynamic: The device may be disabled or enabled at any time.
1321 - System Suspend: The device may request to be disabled or remain
1322 awake during system suspend, but will not be disabled until then.
1323 - Permanent: The device is disabled permanently (until the next hard
1326 Some devices may share a clock domain with each other, such that they should
1327 only be suspended when none of the devices are in use. Where reasonable,
1328 such nodes should be placed on a virtual bus, where the bus has the sleep
1329 property. If the clock domain is shared among devices that cannot be
1330 reasonably grouped in this manner, then create a virtual sleep controller
1331 (similar to an interrupt nexus, except that defining a standardized
1332 sleep-map should wait until its necessity is demonstrated).
1334 Appendix A - Sample SOC node for MPC8540
1335 ========================================
1338 #address-cells = <1>;
1340 compatible = "fsl,mpc8540-ccsr", "simple-bus";
1341 device_type = "soc";
1342 ranges = <0x00000000 0xe0000000 0x00100000>
1343 bus-frequency = <0>;
1344 interrupt-parent = <&pic>;
1347 #address-cells = <1>;
1349 device_type = "network";
1351 compatible = "gianfar", "simple-bus";
1352 reg = <0x24000 0x1000>;
1353 local-mac-address = [ 00 E0 0C 00 73 00 ];
1354 interrupts = <29 2 30 2 34 2>;
1355 phy-handle = <&phy0>;
1356 sleep = <&pmc 00000080>;
1360 reg = <0x24520 0x20>;
1361 compatible = "fsl,gianfar-mdio";
1363 phy0: ethernet-phy@0 {
1366 device_type = "ethernet-phy";
1369 phy1: ethernet-phy@1 {
1372 device_type = "ethernet-phy";
1375 phy3: ethernet-phy@3 {
1378 device_type = "ethernet-phy";
1384 device_type = "network";
1386 compatible = "gianfar";
1387 reg = <0x25000 0x1000>;
1388 local-mac-address = [ 00 E0 0C 00 73 01 ];
1389 interrupts = <13 2 14 2 18 2>;
1390 phy-handle = <&phy1>;
1391 sleep = <&pmc 00000040>;
1395 device_type = "network";
1397 compatible = "gianfar";
1398 reg = <0x26000 0x1000>;
1399 local-mac-address = [ 00 E0 0C 00 73 02 ];
1400 interrupts = <41 2>;
1401 phy-handle = <&phy3>;
1402 sleep = <&pmc 00000020>;
1406 #address-cells = <1>;
1408 compatible = "fsl,mpc8540-duart", "simple-bus";
1409 sleep = <&pmc 00000002>;
1413 device_type = "serial";
1414 compatible = "ns16550";
1415 reg = <0x4500 0x100>;
1416 clock-frequency = <0>;
1417 interrupts = <42 2>;
1421 device_type = "serial";
1422 compatible = "ns16550";
1423 reg = <0x4600 0x100>;
1424 clock-frequency = <0>;
1425 interrupts = <42 2>;
1430 interrupt-controller;
1431 #address-cells = <0>;
1432 #interrupt-cells = <2>;
1433 reg = <0x40000 0x40000>;
1434 compatible = "chrp,open-pic";
1435 device_type = "open-pic";
1439 interrupts = <43 2>;
1440 reg = <0x3000 0x100>;
1441 compatible = "fsl-i2c";
1443 sleep = <&pmc 00000004>;
1447 compatible = "fsl,mpc8540-pmc", "fsl,mpc8548-pmc";
1448 reg = <0xe0070 0x20>;