Re: [libgpiod] Documentation question

[Phil Howard <phil@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sun, 31 Dec 2023 at 19:40, Seamus de Mora <seamusdemora@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> On Sun, Dec 31, 2023 at 4:50 AM Kent Gibson <warthog618@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> >
> > Oh, and you are still wanting to clarify why the GPIO uAPI/libgpiod only
> > deals with the GPIO subsystem?
> > Not sure you will find anything that states that explicitly as it is
> > minimalist Unix philosophy - do one thing well.
> > So the GPIO uAPI only deals with the GPIO subsystem, and libgpiod only
> > deals with the GPIO uAPI.
>
> No - it was something I read. I want to find it again so I can use it
> as a reference for something I'm writing.
> But not to worry, I'll make do without it... and it's obvious once you
> begin using the library :)

Dollars to donuts it was this:
https://lore.kernel.org/all/CAKdJ40QqZt3MbeLNZ1fuYRgaTqSJeDaDdHkQSx1-KWCW4BcJPg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx/T/

If I may pull a quote:

"No, you haven't missed anything except Unix ideology. That ideology is
telling us that one tool for one thing, and in very featurable mode.
That said, lingpiod is exclusively for GPIO ABI between kernel and
user space. For PWM you need to access the PWM ABI in a way how it's
represented by the Linux kernel. I believe there are plenty of
libraries more or less okayish for that purpose, but I never heard
about any official library and/or Python bindings for it."

>
> > If you want an over-arching library that deals with all the possible
> > functions of GPIO lines, like lgpio tries to, then you can always write
> > something that sits above libgpiod and the other subsystem interfaces,
> > though I'm not sure what advantage that would provide over treating with
> > each of them independently.
>
> No, no - nothing like that...
>


-- 
Philip Howard
Technology & Lifestyle Writer
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