How to use Pulse Width Modulation driver

Last modified by Microchip on 2025/02/28 14:12

Introduction

This page describes how PWM could be configured, debugged and used on SAMA5D2 devices. Since linux-4.9-at91 the PWM could be configured using the new Linux PWM framework support called atomic PWM. This allow changing the PWM parameters without the need of disable and re-enable the correspondent PWM channel.

Supported devices

The following table specifies the pins on different boards which could be used as PWM outputs and the correspondent Linux PWM channels.

Board Name	Connector	Connector Pin	PWM Signal	Linux Channel
SAM9X60 EK	J14 (mikroBUS)	16 (PWM)	PWM2	2
SAMA5D29-Curiosity	J19 (mikroBUS 1)	PA31 (PWM)	PWML0	0
SAMA5D29-Curiosity	J14 (mikroBUS 2)	PB0 (PWM)	PWMH1	0
SAMA5D27 WLSOM1 EK	J19 (mikroBUS 1)	16 (PWM)	PWMH0	0
SAMA5D27 WLSOM1 EK	J20 (mikroBUS 2)	16 (PWM)	PWML0	0
SAMA5D27 SOM1 EK	J25 (mikroBUS 1)	1 (PWM)	PWML1	1
SAMA5D27 SOM1 EK	J30 (mikroBUS 2)	1 (PWM)	PWML0	0
SAMA5D2 Xplained	J20	1	PWML2	2
	J20	2	PWMH2
	J26	8	PWML2
	J26	7	PWMH2
SAMA5D3 Xplained	J19	PA21	PWML0	0
		PA20	PWMH0	0
		PA23	PWML1	1
		PA31	PWML1
		PB27	PWMH1
		PA22	PWMH1
SAMA5D4 Xplained	J7	2	PWML0	0
		5	PWMH0	0
		3	PWML1	1
		6	PWMH1	1
	J8	8	PWML0	0
		7	PWMH0
		3	PWMH0
		2	PWML1	1
		4	PWML1	1
		6	PWML2	2
		5	PWMH2	2
	J15	4	PWML0	0
		26	PWMH1	1
		10	PWML2	2
		9	PWMH2	2
		33	PWML3	3
	J17	4	PWML3	3
	J18	4	PWML2	2
	J18	8	PWMH2	2
	J19	7	PWML3	3
	J19	8	PWMH3	3
	J22	8	PWML3	3
	J22	7	PWMH3	3
	J23	8	PWML2	2
	J23	7	PWMH2	2

Kernel support

To enable the Linux kernel PWM support just enable the CONFIG_PWM flag:

make menuconfig

Device drivers ->
   Pulse-Width Modulation (PWM) Support

To enable the SAMA5D2 PWM driver just enable the CONFIG_PWM_ATMEL flag:

make menuconfig

Device drivers -> 
   Pulse-Width Modulation (PWM) Support -> 
      Atmel PWM support

PWM configurations

General

Current Linux implementation supports changing of 3 PWM parameters (signal period, signal duty cycle, signal polarity) and to change PWM channel state (enable/disable). The Linux sysfs interface which could be used to configure the PWM parameters is located at:

/sys/class/pwm/*

The PWM chips which are present in the system are listed in /sys/class/pwm

root@sama5d2-xplained:~# ls -l /sys/class/pwm/    
total 0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 0 Jun  6 16:06 pwmchip0 -> ../../devices/platform/ahb/ahb:apb/f802c000.pwm/pwm/pwmchip0

The presence of pwmchip0 suggest that there is one PWM chip on the system.

Available PWM channels

To check how many PWM channels could be configured the npwm file could be used. For instance, to check how many PWM channels supports PWM chip pwmchip0 above the following command could be used:

root@sama5d2-xplained:~# cat /sys/class/pwm/pwmchip0/npwm 
4

This means pwmchip0 supports 4 PWM channels.

PWM channel export

To configure a PWM channel, fist, the PWM channel needs to be exported. To export a PWM channel the number of the channel needs to be written in /sys/class/pwm/pwmchipX/export file.

root@sama5d2-xplained:~# echo 2 > /sys/class/pwm/pwmchip0/export

After that, the PWM 2 channel is exported in sysfs and it’s parameters could be changed.

root@sama5d2-xplained:~# ls -l /sys/class/pwm/pwmchip0/
total 0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root    0 Jun  6 15:17 device -> ../../../f802c000.pwm
--w------- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:16 export
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:17 npwm
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root    0 Jun  6 15:17 power
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root    0 Jun  6 15:17 pwm2
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root    0 Jun  6 15:17 subsystem -> ../../../../../../../class/pwm
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:15 uevent
--w------- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:17 unexport

root@sama5d2-xplained:~# ls -l /sys/class/pwm/pwmchip0/pwm2/  
total 0
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:18 capture
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:18 duty_cycle
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:18 enable
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:18 period
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:18 polarity
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root    0 Jun  6 15:18 power
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Jun  6 15:18 uevent

A new fresh exported signal has the following parameters:
period = 0
duty_cycle = 0
polarity = normal
enable = 0
A cat on the files from /sys/class/pwm/pwmchipX/pwmY will print these values.

TIPS:: The capture file could be used to capture the PWM signal. The Atmel products doesn’t support this feature.

Period configuration

To configure period parameter for a PWM channel write the desired period value, in nanoseconds, in period file. For instance, to configure a 0.5 seconds period for PWM 2 channel use the following command:

echo 500000000 > /sys/class/pwm/pwmchip0/pwm2/period

Duty cycle configuration

To configure duty cycle parameter for a PWM channel write the desired duty cycle value, in nanoseconds, in duty_cycle file. For instance, to configure a 0.25 seconds duty cycle for PWM 2 channel use the following command:

echo 250000000 > /sys/class/pwm/pwmchip0/pwm2/duty_cycle

Polarity configuration

Linux PWM implementation defines normal and inversed polarities for PWM signals. To configure signal polarity for a PWM channel write one of these strings to polarity file. For instance, to configure inversed polarity for PWM 2 channel use the following command:

echo inversed > /sys/class/pwm/pwmchip0/pwm2/polarity

Enable/Disable PWM channels

To enable or disable a PWM channel write a 1 or a 0 in the enable file. For instance, to enable PWM 2 channel use the following command:

echo 1 > /sys/class/pwm/pwmchip0/pwm2/enable

Below is a picture with PWM signals (PWMH and PWML) on PWM channel 2, configured with above parameters, on SAMA5D2 Xplained board:

After a channel was exported and configured its parameters could be changed. Starting with linux-4.9-at91 the parameters could be changed on the fly. With version below linux-4.9-at91, if a PWM channel was exported and configured a new configuration imply to first disable the channel, reconfigure and then re-enable it.

Configuring PWM channels via device tree

Besides the sysfs, a Linux PWM channel could be requested by other drivers (e.g. regulators, leds or backlight drivers) with a set of default parameters. This is done using the pwms binding. For instance, the PWM regulator could request PWM channel 2 using the following device tree bindings:

   pwm_regulator {
      compatible = "pwm-regulator";
      pwms = <&pwm0 2 500000000 0>;
      regulator-name = "PWM_REGULATOR";
      regulator-min-microvolt = <0>;
      regulator-max-microvolt = <3300000>;
      regulator-always-on;
   };

- the first parameter of pwms binding specify the label of PWM controller in device tree
- the second parameter specifies the PWM channel to be requested by PWM regulator driver
- the third parameter specifies the PWM signal period (in nanoseconds)
- the fourth parameter specifies the PWM signal polarity (0 = normal, 1 = inversed)

Debugging PWM

Linux offers a file in /sys/kernel/debug which could be used to see the state of PWM channels.

root@sama5d2-xplained:~# cat /sys/kernel/debug/pwm 
platform/f802c000.pwm, 4 PWM devices
 pwm-0   ((null)              ): period: 0 ns duty: 0 ns polarity: normal mode: complementary trigger: none
 pwm-1   ((null)              ): period: 0 ns duty: 0 ns polarity: normal mode: complementary trigger: none
 pwm-2   (sysfs               ): requested enabled period: 500000000 ns duty: 250000000 ns polarity: normal
 pwm-3   ((null)              ): period: 0 ns duty: 0 ns polarity: normal mode: complementary trigger: none

-- Claudiu Beznea - 2017-07-03

How to use Pulse Width Modulation driver

Introduction

Supported devices

Kernel support

PWM configurations

General

Available PWM channels

PWM channel export

Period configuration

Duty cycle configuration

Polarity configuration

Enable/Disable PWM channels

Configuring PWM channels via device tree

Debugging PWM

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