ftl_cs - Flash Translation Layer driver for PCMCIA memory cards

insmod ftl_cs.o [pc_debug=c n] [major_dev=c n]

Flash memory devices typically need to be erased before they are written, and most flash devices can only be erased on large block boundaries like 64K or 128K. The Flash Translation Layer driver, ftl_cs, implements a sort of virtual sector-addressable block device that hides the details of erase operations. Using the FTL driver, a flash memory card can be treated as an ordinary block device.

The ftl_cs driver allocates a major device number when it is loaded. Minor device numbers have a bitwise layout of 'dddrrppp'. 'ddd' is the device number, with one card counting as one device. 'rr' is the common-memory region number, generally 0. And 'ppp' selects a logical partition within the FTL region.

The default configuration script for FTL devices will create a block device with the name of the form '/dev/ftl{d}c{r}', where '{d}' is the device number and '{r}' is the region number, that spans the entire FTL region. It also creates devices '/dev/ftl{d}c{r}p[1-4]' pointing to partitions 1 through 4 within this FTL region.

An FTL region must be formatted before use. The formatting utility, ftl_format, needs to write to the corresponding raw memory device rather than the FTL device interface.

pc_debug=n

Selects the PCMCIA debugging level. This parameter is only available if the module is compiled with debugging enabled. A non-zero value enables debugging.

major_dev=n

Selects the major device number to allocate for FTL devices. The default is to pick any available major number.

David Hinds - dahinds@users.sourceforge.net

ftl_format(8), cardmgr(8), memory_cs(4), pcmcia(5).