diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation/usb/mass-storage.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | Documentation/usb/mass-storage.txt | 226 |
1 files changed, 226 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/usb/mass-storage.txt b/Documentation/usb/mass-storage.txt new file mode 100644 index 00000000000..e9b9334627b --- /dev/null +++ b/Documentation/usb/mass-storage.txt @@ -0,0 +1,226 @@ +* Overview + + Mass Storage Gadget (or MSG) acts as a USB Mass Storage device, + appearing to the host as a disk or a CD-ROM drive. It supports + multiple logical units (LUNs). Backing storage for each LUN is + provided by a regular file or a block device, access can be limited + to read-only, and gadget can indicate that it is removable and/or + CD-ROM (the latter implies read-only access). + + Its requirements are modest; only a bulk-in and a bulk-out endpoint + are needed. The memory requirement amounts to two 16K buffers. + Support is included for full-speed, high-speed and SuperSpeed + operation. + + Note that the driver is slightly non-portable in that it assumes + a single memory/DMA buffer will be useable for bulk-in and bulk-out + endpoints. With most device controllers this is not an issue, but + there may be some with hardware restrictions that prevent a buffer + from being used by more than one endpoint. + + This document describes how to use the gadget from user space, its + relation to mass storage function (or MSF) and different gadgets + using it, and how it differs from File Storage Gadget (or FSG). It + will talk only briefly about how to use MSF within composite + gadgets. + +* Module parameters + + The mass storage gadget accepts the following mass storage specific + module parameters: + + - file=filename[,filename...] + + This parameter lists paths to files or block devices used for + backing storage for each logical unit. There may be at most + FSG_MAX_LUNS (8) LUNs set. If more files are specified, they will + be silently ignored. See also “luns” parameter. + + *BEWARE* that if a file is used as a backing storage, it may not + be modified by any other process. This is because the host + assumes the data does not change without its knowledge. It may be + read, but (if the logical unit is writable) due to buffering on + the host side, the contents are not well defined. + + The size of the logical unit will be rounded down to a full + logical block. The logical block size is 2048 bytes for LUNs + simulating CD-ROM, block size of the device if the backing file is + a block device, or 512 bytes otherwise. + + - removable=b[,b...] + + This parameter specifies whether each logical unit should be + removable. “b” here is either “y”, “Y” or “1” for true or “n”, + “N” or “0” for false. + + If this option is set for a logical unit, gadget will accept an + “eject” SCSI request (Start/Stop Unit). When it is sent, the + backing file will be closed to simulate ejection and the logical + unit will not be mountable by the host until a new backing file is + specified by userspace on the device (see “sysfs entries” + section). + + If a logical unit is not removable (the default), a backing file + must be specified for it with the “file” parameter as the module + is loaded. The same applies if the module is built in, no + exceptions. + + The default value of the flag is false, *HOWEVER* it used to be + true. This has been changed to better match File Storage Gadget + and because it seems like a saner default after all. Thus to + maintain compatibility with older kernels, it's best to specify + the default values. Also, if one relied on old default, explicit + “n” needs to be specified now. + + Note that “removable” means the logical unit's media can be + ejected or removed (as is true for a CD-ROM drive or a card + reader). It does *not* mean that the entire gadget can be + unplugged from the host; the proper term for that is + “hot-unpluggable”. + + - cdrom=b[,b...] + + This parameter specifies whether each logical unit should simulate + CD-ROM. The default is false. + + - ro=b[,b...] + + This parameter specifies whether each logical unit should be + reported as read only. This will prevent host from modifying the + backing files. + + Note that if this flag for given logical unit is false but the + backing file could not be opened in read/write mode, the gadget + will fall back to read only mode anyway. + + The default value for non-CD-ROM logical units is false; for + logical units simulating CD-ROM it is forced to true. + + - nofua=b[,b...] + + This parameter specifies whether FUA flag should be ignored in SCSI + Write10 and Write12 commands sent to given logical units. + + MS Windows mounts removable storage in “Removal optimised mode” by + default. All the writes to the media are synchronous, which is + achieved by setting the FUA (Force Unit Access) bit in SCSI + Write(10,12) commands. This forces each write to wait until the + data has actually been written out and prevents I/O requests + aggregation in block layer dramatically decreasing performance. + + Note that this may mean that if the device is powered from USB and + the user unplugs the device without unmounting it first (which at + least some Windows users do), the data may be lost. + + The default value is false. + + - luns=N + + This parameter specifies number of logical units the gadget will + have. It is limited by FSG_MAX_LUNS (8) and higher value will be + capped. + + If this parameter is provided, and the number of files specified + in “file” argument is greater then the value of “luns”, all excess + files will be ignored. + + If this parameter is not present, the number of logical units will + be deduced from the number of files specified in the “file” + parameter. If the file parameter is missing as well, one is + assumed. + + - stall=b + + Specifies whether the gadget is allowed to halt bulk endpoints. + The default is determined according to the type of USB device + controller, but usually true. + + In addition to the above, the gadget also accepts the following + parameters defined by the composite framework (they are common to + all composite gadgets so just a quick listing): + + - idVendor -- USB Vendor ID (16 bit integer) + - idProduct -- USB Product ID (16 bit integer) + - bcdDevice -- USB Device version (BCD) (16 bit integer) + - iManufacturer -- USB Manufacturer string (string) + - iProduct -- USB Product string (string) + - iSerialNumber -- SerialNumber string (sting) + +* sysfs entries + + For each logical unit, the gadget creates a directory in the sysfs + hierarchy. Inside of it the following three files are created: + + - file + + When read it returns the path to the backing file for the given + logical unit. If there is no backing file (possible only if the + logical unit is removable), the content is empty. + + When written into, it changes the backing file for given logical + unit. This change can be performed even if given logical unit is + not specified as removable (but that may look strange to the + host). It may fail, however, if host disallowed medium removal + with the Prevent-Allow Medium Removal SCSI command. + + - ro + + Reflects the state of ro flag for the given logical unit. It can + be read any time, and written to when there is no backing file + open for given logical unit. + + - nofua + + Reflects the state of nofua flag for given logical unit. It can + be read and written. + + Other then those, as usual, the values of module parameters can be + read from /sys/module/g_mass_storage/parameters/* files. + +* Other gadgets using mass storage function + + The Mass Storage Gadget uses the Mass Storage Function to handle + mass storage protocol. As a composite function, MSF may be used by + other gadgets as well (eg. g_multi and acm_ms). + + All of the information in previous sections are valid for other + gadgets using MSF, except that support for mass storage related + module parameters may be missing, or the parameters may have + a prefix. To figure out whether any of this is true one needs to + consult the gadget's documentation or its source code. + + For examples of how to include mass storage function in gadgets, one + may take a look at mass_storage.c, acm_ms.c and multi.c (sorted by + complexity). + +* Relation to file storage gadget + + The Mass Storage Function and thus the Mass Storage Gadget has been + based on the File Storage Gadget. The difference between the two is + that MSG is a composite gadget (ie. uses the composite framework) + while file storage gadget is a traditional gadget. From userspace + point of view this distinction does not really matter, but from + kernel hacker's point of view, this means that (i) MSG does not + duplicate code needed for handling basic USB protocol commands and + (ii) MSF can be used in any other composite gadget. + + Because of that, File Storage Gadget has been deprecated and + scheduled to be removed in Linux 3.8. All users need to transition + to the Mass Storage Gadget by that time. The two gadgets behave + mostly the same from the outside except: + + 1. In FSG the “removable” and “cdrom” module parameters set the flag + for all logical units whereas in MSG they accept a list of y/n + values for each logical unit. If one uses only a single logical + unit this does not matter, but if there are more, the y/n value + needs to be repeated for each logical unit. + + 2. FSG's “serial”, “vendor”, “product” and “release” module + parameters are handled in MSG by the composite layer's parameters + named respectively: “iSerialnumber”, “idVendor”, “idProduct” and + “bcdDevice”. + + 3. MSG does not support FSG's test mode, thus “transport”, + “protocol” and “buflen” FSG's module parameters are not + supported. MSG always uses SCSI protocol with bulk only + transport mode and 16 KiB buffers. |