DTC(1) BSD General Commands Manual DTC(1)
NAME
dtc -- device tree compiler
SYNOPSIS
dtc [-fhsv] [-b boot_cpu_id] [-d dependency_file] [-E [no-]checker_name] [-H phandle_format] [-I input_format] [-O output_format]
[-o output_file] [-R entries] [-S bytes] [-p bytes] [-V blob_version] [-W [no-]checker_name] [-P predefined_properties] input_file
DESCRIPTION
The dtc utility converts flattened device tree (FDT) representations.
It is most commonly used to generate device tree blobs (DTB), the binary representation of an FDT, from device tree sources (DTS), the ASCII
text source representation.
The binary can be written in two formats, binary and assembly. The binary is identical to the in-memory representation and can be used
directly by firmware, loaders, and so on. The assembly format, documented in ASM FORMAT, will produce the same binary format when assembled,
but also includes some global variables that refer to parts of the table. This format is most commonly used to produce a kernel specific to
a device, with the device tree blob compiled in.
The options are as follows:
-d dependency_file
Writes a dependency file understandable by make to the specified file. This file can be included in a Makefile and will ensure that
the output file depends on the input file and any files that it includes. This argument is only useful when the input is DTS, as
only the source format has a notion of inclusions.
-E [no-]checker_name
Enable or disable a specified checker. The argument is the name of the checker. The full list of checkers is given in CHECKERS.
-f Force the tool to attempt to generate the output, even if the input had errors.
-h Display the help text and exit.
-H phandle_format
Specifies the type of phandle nodes to generate in the output. Valid values are:
linux Generate the legacy linux,phandle nodes expected by older systems.
epapr Generate the phandle nodes, as described in the ePAPR specification. This is the most sensible option for device trees being
used with FreeBSD.
both Generate both, for maximum compatibility.
-I input_format
Specifies the input format. Valid values are:
dtb Device tree blob. The binary representation of the FDT.
dts Device tree source. The ASCII representation of the FDT. This is the default if the input format is not explicitly stated.
-O output_format
Specifies the output format. Valid values are:
asm Assembler source for generating a device tree blob, as described in ASM FORMAT.
dtb Device tree blob. The binary representation of the FDT. This is the default if the output format is not explicitly stated.
dts Device tree source. The ASCII representation of the FDT.
-o output_file
The file to which to write the output.
-P predefined_macro
Defines a macro, in the form name=value or name to be used for device tree source files that contain conditional components. This
tool supports two extensions to the standard to support conditional compilation of device trees. The first is an /include/if
[property]/ file.dts directive that is allowed at the start of a file and which will only include the specified file if it the speci-
fied property is passed with this flag. The second is the $NAME format for property values. These allow property value to be speci-
fied on the command line.
-R entries
The number of empty reservation table entries to pad the table with. This is useful if you are generating a device tree blob for
bootloader or similar that needs to reserve some memory before passing control to the operating system.
-S bytes
The minimum size in bytes of the blob. The blob will be padded after the strings table to ensure that it is the correct size. This
is useful for environments where the device tree blob must be modified in place.
-p bytes
The number of bytes of padding to add to the blob. The blob will be padded after the strings table to ensure that it is the correct
size. This is useful for environments where the device tree blob must be modified in place.
-W [no-]checker_name
Enable or disable a specified checker. This is an alias for -E.
-s Sorts the properties and nodes in the tree. This is mainly useful when using tools like diff(1) to compare two device tree sources.
-V output_version
The version of the format to output. This is only relevant for binary outputs, and only a value of 17 is currently supported.
-v Display the tool version and exit.
input_file
The source file.
ASM FORMAT
The assembly format defines several globals that can be referred to from other compilation units, in addition to any labels specified in the
source. These are:
dt_blob_start start of the device tree blob.
dt_header start of the header, usually identical to the start of the blob.
dt_reserve_map start of the reservation map.
dt_struct_start start of the structure table.
dt_struct_end end of the structure table.
dt_strings_start start of the strings table.
dt_strings_end end of the strings table.
dt_blob_end end of the device tree blob.
CHECKERS
The utility provides a number of semantic checks on the correctness of the tree. These can be disabled with the -W flag. For example, -W
no-type-phandle will disable the phandle type check. The supported checks are:
type-compatible Checks the type of the compatible property.
type-model Checks the type of the model property.
type-compatible Checks the type of the compatible property.
cells-attributes
Checks that all nodes with children have both #address-cells and #size-cells properties.
EXAMPLES
The command:
dtc -o blob.S -O asm device.dts
will generate a blob.S file from the device tree source device.dts and print errors if any occur during parsing or property checking. The
resulting file can be assembled and linked into a binary.
The command:
dtc -o - -O dts -I dtb device.dtb
will write the device tree source for the device tree blob device.dtb to the standard output. This is useful when debugging device trees.
COMPATIBILITY
This utility is intended to be compatible with the device tree compiler provided by elinux.org. Currently, it implements the subset of fea-
tures required to build FreeBSD and others that have been requested by FreeBSD developers.
The fs input format is not supported. This builds a tree from a Linux /proc/device-tree, a file system hierarchy not found in FreeBSD, which
instead exposes the DTB directly via a sysctl.
The warnings and errors supported by the elinux.org tool are not documented. This tool supports the warnings described in the CHECKERS sec-
tion.
SEE ALSO
fdt(4)
STANDARDS
The device tree formats understood by this tool conform to the Power.org Standard for Embedded Power Architecture Platform Requirements
(ePAPR), except as noted in the BUGS section and with the following exceptions for compatibility with the elinux.org tool:
o The target of cross references is defined to be a node name in the specification, but is in fact a label.
The /include/ directive is not part of the standard, however it is implemented with the semantics compatible with the elinux.org tool. It
must appear in the top level of a file, and imports a new root definition. If a file, plus all of its inclusions, contains multiple roots
then they are merged. All nodes that are present in the second but not the first are imported. Any that appear in both are recursively
merged, with properties from the second replacing those from the first and properties child nodes being recursively merged.
HISTORY
A dtc tool first appeared in FreeBSD 9.0. This version of the tool first appeared in FreeBSD 10.0.
AUTHORS
David T. Chisnall
Note: The fact that the tool and the author share the same initials is entirely coincidental.
BUGS
The device tree compiler does not yet support the following features:
o Labels in the middle of property values. This is only useful in the assembly output, and only vaguely useful there, so is unlikely to be
added soon.
o Full paths, rather than labels, as the targets for phandles. This is not very hard to add, but will probably not be added until some-
thing actually needs it.
The current version performs a very limited set of semantic checks on the tree. This will be improved in future versions.
BSD
January 1, 2013 BSD