Video Device Drivers

  • include/nuttx/video/. All structures and APIs needed to work with video drivers are provided in this header file.

max7456

23 March 2019 Bill Gatliff <bgat@billgatliff.com>

The code in drivers/video/max7456.[ch] is a preliminary device driver for the MAX7456 analog on-screen-display generator. This SPI slave chip is a popular feature in many embedded devices due its low cost and power requirements. In particular, you see it a lot on drone flight-management units.

I use the term “preliminary” because at present, only the most rudimentary capabilities of the chip are supported:

  • chip reset and startup

  • read and write low-level chip control registers (DEBUG mode only)

  • write CA (Character Address) data to the chip’s framebuffer memory

Some key missing features are, in no particular order:

  • VSYNC and HSYNC synchronization (prevents flicker)

  • ability to update NVM (define custom character sets)

If you have a factory-fresh chip, then the datasheet shows you what the factory character data set looks like. If you’ve used the chip in other scenarios, i.e. with Betaflight or similar, then your chip will almost certainly have had the factory character data replaced with something application-specific.

Either way, you’ll probably want to update your character set before long. I should probably get that working, unless you want to take a look at it yoruself…

The max7456_register() function starts things rolling. The omnibusf4 target device provides an example (there may be others by the time you read this).

In normal use, the driver creates a set of interfaces under /dev, i.e.:

/dev/osd0/fb
/dev/osd0/raw   (*)
/dev/osd0/vsync (*)

    • not yet implemented

By writing character data to the “fb” interface, you’ll see data appear on the display. NOTE that the data you write is NOT, for example, ASCII text: it is the addresses of the characters in the chip’s onboard character map.

For example, if entry 42 in your onboard character map is a bitmap that looks like “H”, then when you write the ASCII “*” (decimal 42, hex 2a), you’ll see that “H” appear on your screen.

If you build the code with the DEBUG macro defined, you will see a bunch more interfaces:

/dev/osd0/VM0
/dev/osd0/VM1
/dev/osd/DMM
...
...

These are interfaces to the low-level chip registers, which can be read and/or written to help you figure out what’s going on inside the chip. They’re probably more useful for me than you, but there they are in case I’m wrong about that.

b.g.