Re: [PATCH v4] kernel: Add support for power-off handler call chain

From: Guenter Roeck
Date: Tue Oct 28 2014 - 16:04:35 EST


On Tue, Oct 28, 2014 at 07:23:12PM +0100, Pavel Machek wrote:
> On Tue 2014-10-28 10:11:06, Guenter Roeck wrote:
> > Various drivers implement architecture and/or device specific means to
> > power off the system. For the most part, those drivers set the global
> > variable pm_power_off to point to a function within the driver.
> >
> > This mechanism has a number of drawbacks. Typically only one scheme
> > to remove power is supported (at least if pm_power_off is used).
> > At least in theory there can be multiple means remove power, some of
> > which may be less desirable. For example, some mechanisms may only
> > power off the CPU or the CPU card, while another may power off the
> > entire system. Others may really just execute a restart sequence
> > or drop into the ROM monitor. Using pm_power_off can also be racy
> > if the function pointer is set from a driver built as module, as the
> > driver may be in the process of being unloaded when pm_power_off is
> > called. If there are multiple power-off handlers in the system, removing
> > a module with such a handler may inadvertently reset the pointer to
> > pm_power_off to NULL, leaving the system with no means to remove power.
> >
> > Introduce a system power-off handler call chain to solve the described
> > problems. This call chain is expected to be executed from the architecture
> > specific machine_power_off() function. Drivers and architeceture code
> > providing system power-off functionality are expected to register with
> > this call chain. When registering a power-off handler, callers can
> > provide a priority to control power-off handler execution sequence
> > and thus ensure that the power-off handler with the optimal capabilities
> > to remove power for a given system is called first.
> >
> > Cc: Alan Cox <gnomes@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > Cc: Alexander Graf <agraf@xxxxxxx>
> > Cc: Andrew Morton <akpm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > Cc: Geert Uytterhoeven <geert@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > cc: Heiko Stuebner <heiko@xxxxxxxxx>
> > Cc: Lee Jones <lee.jones@xxxxxxxxxx>
> > Cc: Len Brown <len.brown@xxxxxxxxx>
>
> Acked-by: Pavel Machek <pavel@xxxxxx>
>
Thanks!

Guenter
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