Simple Linux i2c example
This is a simple program to read a byte from an i2c client under Linux. It is provided as example code; if you want a real program use i2cget from the i2c-tools package.
It assumes the i2c client does not have a driver bound to it. If you have a driver bound, it might look like this:
# i2c_example /dev/i2c-9 0x4a 0
i2c_example: Tried to set device address '0x4a': Device or resource busy
To unbind, use sysfs:
# ls /sys/bus/i2c/drivers/lm75
9-004a bind uevent unbind
# echo 9-004a > /sys/bus/i2c/drivers/lm75/unbind
If you want to go in to expert mode, change I2C_SLAVE to I2C_SLAVE_FORCE
in the ioctl which will let you read from the client even with a driver
bound. If you do this you get to keep both pieces.
Building
The program assumes you have a GCC called arm-linux-gnueabi-gcc in your path.
On Ubuntu, this can be installed with apt-get install gcc-arm-linux-gnueabi.
If you obtain your compiler through different means, update the CROSS_COMPILE
prefix in Makefile with the prefix of your compiler.
If you want to compile natively, unset the CROSS_COMPILE variable.
$ make
arm-linux-gnueabi-gcc -Wall -std=gnu11 -ggdb -c -o i2c_example.o i2c_example.c
arm-linux-gnueabi-gcc -static i2c_example.o -o i2c_example
This builds a statically linked program that you can then copy to the target machine.
Usage
# i2c_example
i2c_example: path [i2c address] [register]
# i2c_example /dev/i2c-3 0x76 0x1
/dev/i2c-3: device 0x76 at address 0x01: 0x00