The Digital TV Frontend kABI defines a driver-internal interface for
registering low-level, hardware specific driver to a hardware independent
frontend layer. It is only of interest for Digital TV device driver writers.
-The header file for this API is named dvb_frontend.h and located in
-drivers/media/dvb-core.
+The header file for this API is named ``dvb_frontend.h`` and located in
+``drivers/media/dvb-core``.
+
+Demodulator driver
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+The demodulator driver is responsible to talk with the decoding part of the
+hardware. Such driver should implement :c:type:`dvb_frontend_ops`, with
+tells what type of digital TV standards are supported, and points to a
+series of functions that allow the DVB core to command the hardware via
+the code under ``drivers/media/dvb-core/dvb_frontend.c``.
+
+A typical example of such struct in a driver ``foo`` is::
+
+ static struct dvb_frontend_ops foo_ops = {
+ .delsys = { SYS_DVBT, SYS_DVBT2, SYS_DVBC_ANNEX_A },
+ .info = {
+ .name = "foo DVB-T/T2/C driver",
+ .caps = FE_CAN_FEC_1_2 |
+ FE_CAN_FEC_2_3 |
+ FE_CAN_FEC_3_4 |
+ FE_CAN_FEC_5_6 |
+ FE_CAN_FEC_7_8 |
+ FE_CAN_FEC_AUTO |
+ FE_CAN_QPSK |
+ FE_CAN_QAM_16 |
+ FE_CAN_QAM_32 |
+ FE_CAN_QAM_64 |
+ FE_CAN_QAM_128 |
+ FE_CAN_QAM_256 |
+ FE_CAN_QAM_AUTO |
+ FE_CAN_TRANSMISSION_MODE_AUTO |
+ FE_CAN_GUARD_INTERVAL_AUTO |
+ FE_CAN_HIERARCHY_AUTO |
+ FE_CAN_MUTE_TS |
+ FE_CAN_2G_MODULATION,
+ .frequency_min = 42000000, /* Hz */
+ .frequency_max = 1002000000, /* Hz */
+ .symbol_rate_min = 870000,
+ .symbol_rate_max = 11700000
+ },
+ .init = foo_init,
+ .sleep = foo_sleep,
+ .release = foo_release,
+ .set_frontend = foo_set_frontend,
+ .get_frontend = foo_get_frontend,
+ .read_status = foo_get_status_and_stats,
+ .tune = foo_tune,
+ .i2c_gate_ctrl = foo_i2c_gate_ctrl,
+ .get_frontend_algo = foo_get_algo,
+ };
+
+A typical example of such struct in a driver ``bar`` meant to be used on
+Satellite TV reception is::
+
+ static const struct dvb_frontend_ops bar_ops = {
+ .delsys = { SYS_DVBS, SYS_DVBS2 },
+ .info = {
+ .name = "Bar DVB-S/S2 demodulator",
+ .frequency_min = 500000, /* KHz */
+ .frequency_max = 2500000, /* KHz */
+ .frequency_stepsize = 0,
+ .symbol_rate_min = 1000000,
+ .symbol_rate_max = 45000000,
+ .symbol_rate_tolerance = 500,
+ .caps = FE_CAN_INVERSION_AUTO |
+ FE_CAN_FEC_AUTO |
+ FE_CAN_QPSK,
+ },
+ .init = bar_init,
+ .sleep = bar_sleep,
+ .release = bar_release,
+ .set_frontend = bar_set_frontend,
+ .get_frontend = bar_get_frontend,
+ .read_status = bar_get_status_and_stats,
+ .i2c_gate_ctrl = bar_i2c_gate_ctrl,
+ .get_frontend_algo = bar_get_algo,
+ .tune = bar_tune,
+
+ /* Satellite-specific */
+ .diseqc_send_master_cmd = bar_send_diseqc_msg,
+ .diseqc_send_burst = bar_send_burst,
+ .set_tone = bar_set_tone,
+ .set_voltage = bar_set_voltage,
+ };
+
+.. note::
+
+ #) For satellite digital TV standards (DVB-S, DVB-S2, ISDB-S), the
+ frequencies are specified in kHz, while, for terrestrial and cable
+ standards, they're specified in Hz. Due to that, if the same frontend
+ supports both types, you'll need to have two separate
+ :c:type:`dvb_frontend_ops` structures, one for each standard.
+ #) The ``.i2c_gate_ctrl`` field is present only when the hardware has
+ allows controlling an I2C gate (either directly of via some GPIO pin),
+ in order to remove the tuner from the I2C bus after a channel is
+ tuned.
+ #) All new drivers should implement the
+ :ref:`DVBv5 statistics <dvbv5_stats>` via ``.read_status``.
+ Yet, there are a number of callbacks meant to get statistics for
+ signal strength, S/N and UCB. Those are there to provide backward
+ compatibility with legacy applications that don't support the DVBv5
+ API. Implementing those callbacks are optional. Those callbacks may be
+ removed in the future, after we have all existing drivers supporting
+ DVBv5 stats.
+ #) Other callbacks are required for satellite TV standards, in order to
+ control LNBf and DiSEqC: ``.diseqc_send_master_cmd``,
+ ``.diseqc_send_burst``, ``.set_tone``, ``.set_voltage``.
+
+.. |delta| unicode:: U+00394
+
+The ``drivers/media/dvb-core/dvb_frontend.c`` has a kernel thread with is
+responsible for tuning the device. It supports multiple algoritms to
+detect a channel, as defined at enum :c:func:`dvbfe_algo`.
+
+The algorithm to be used is obtained via ``.get_frontend_algo``. If the driver
+doesn't fill its field at struct :c:type:`dvb_frontend_ops`, it will default to
+``DVBFE_ALGO_SW``, meaning that the dvb-core will do a zigzag when tuning,
+e. g. it will try first to use the specified center frequency ``f``,
+then, it will do ``f`` + |delta|, ``f`` - |delta|, ``f`` + 2 x |delta|,
+``f`` - 2 x |delta| and so on.
+
+If the hardware has internally a some sort of zigzag algorithm, you should
+define a ``.get_frontend_algo`` function that would return ``DVBFE_ALGO_HW``.
+
+.. note::
+
+ The core frontend support also supports
+ a third type (``DVBFE_ALGO_CUSTOM``), in order to allow the driver to
+ define its own hardware-assisted algorithm. Very few hardware need to
+ use it nowadays. Using ``DVBFE_ALGO_CUSTOM`` require to provide other
+ function callbacks at struct :c:type:`dvb_frontend_ops`.
+
+Attaching frontend driver to the bridge driver
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Before using the Digital TV frontend core, the bridge driver should attach
the frontend demod, tuner and SEC devices and call
A few other optional functions are provided to handle some special cases.
+.. _dvbv5_stats:
+
Digital TV Frontend statistics
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~