xref: /OK3568_Linux_fs/kernel/Documentation/i2c/ten-bit-addresses.rst (revision 4882a59341e53eb6f0b4789bf948001014eff981)
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2*4882a593SmuzhiyunI2C Ten-bit Addresses
3*4882a593Smuzhiyun=====================
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5*4882a593SmuzhiyunThe I2C protocol knows about two kinds of device addresses: normal 7 bit
6*4882a593Smuzhiyunaddresses, and an extended set of 10 bit addresses. The sets of addresses
7*4882a593Smuzhiyundo not intersect: the 7 bit address 0x10 is not the same as the 10 bit
8*4882a593Smuzhiyunaddress 0x10 (though a single device could respond to both of them).
9*4882a593SmuzhiyunTo avoid ambiguity, the user sees 10 bit addresses mapped to a different
10*4882a593Smuzhiyunaddress space, namely 0xa000-0xa3ff. The leading 0xa (= 10) represents the
11*4882a593Smuzhiyun10 bit mode. This is used for creating device names in sysfs. It is also
12*4882a593Smuzhiyunneeded when instantiating 10 bit devices via the new_device file in sysfs.
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14*4882a593SmuzhiyunI2C messages to and from 10-bit address devices have a different format.
15*4882a593SmuzhiyunSee the I2C specification for the details.
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17*4882a593SmuzhiyunThe current 10 bit address support is minimal. It should work, however
18*4882a593Smuzhiyunyou can expect some problems along the way:
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20*4882a593Smuzhiyun* Not all bus drivers support 10-bit addresses. Some don't because the
21*4882a593Smuzhiyun  hardware doesn't support them (SMBus doesn't require 10-bit address
22*4882a593Smuzhiyun  support for example), some don't because nobody bothered adding the
23*4882a593Smuzhiyun  code (or it's there but not working properly.) Software implementation
24*4882a593Smuzhiyun  (i2c-algo-bit) is known to work.
25*4882a593Smuzhiyun* Some optional features do not support 10-bit addresses. This is the
26*4882a593Smuzhiyun  case of automatic detection and instantiation of devices by their,
27*4882a593Smuzhiyun  drivers, for example.
28*4882a593Smuzhiyun* Many user-space packages (for example i2c-tools) lack support for
29*4882a593Smuzhiyun  10-bit addresses.
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31*4882a593SmuzhiyunNote that 10-bit address devices are still pretty rare, so the limitations
32*4882a593Smuzhiyunlisted above could stay for a long time, maybe even forever if nobody
33*4882a593Smuzhiyunneeds them to be fixed.
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