This is a living document - make sure to check the latest version of this document.
Note
Not all of the currently existing code follows this guideline, yet.
In general, the Rust API Guidelines apply to all projects in the ESP-RS GitHub organization where possible.
- Especially for public API but if possible also for internal APIs.
C-RW-VALUE
andC-SERDE
do not apply.C-COMMON-TRAITS
: The set of traits to implement depend on the type. If nothing here applies, use your best judgement.- Driver structures:
Debug/Display
,PartialEq/Eq
- Driver configuration:
Default
,Debug/Display
,PartialEq/Eq
,Clone/Copy
,Hash
Clone/Copy
depends on the size and contents of the structure. They should generally be implemented, unless there is a good reason not to.- The
Default
configuration needs to make sense for a particular driver, and applying the default configuration must not fail.
- Error types:
Debug/Display
,PartialEq/Eq
,Clone/Copy
,Hash
- Driver structures:
- Drivers must take peripherals via the
PeripheralRef
pattern - they don't consume peripherals directly. - If a driver requires pins, those pins should be configured using
fn with_signal_name(self, pin: impl Peripheral<P = impl PeripheralInput> + 'd) -> Self
orfn with_signal_name(self, pin: impl Peripheral<P = impl PeripheralOutput> + 'd) -> Self
- If a driver supports multiple peripheral instances (for example, I2C0 is one such instance):
- The peripheral instance type must be positioned as the last type parameter of the driver type.
- The peripheral instance type must default to a type that supports any of the peripheral instances.
- The author must to use
crate::any_peripheral
to define the "any" peripheral instance type. - The driver must implement a
new
constructor that automatically converts the peripheral instance into the any type, and anew_typed
that preserves the peripheral type.
- If a driver is configurable, configuration options should be implemented as a
Config
struct in the same module where the driver is located.- The driver's constructor should take the config struct by value, and it should return
Result<Self, ConfigError>
. - The
ConfigError
enum should be separate from otherError
enums used by the driver. - The driver should implement
fn apply_config(&mut self, config: &Config) -> Result<(), ConfigError>
. - In case the driver's configuration is infallible (all possible combinations of options are supported by the hardware), the
ConfigError
should be implemented as an emptyenum
. - Configuration structs should derive
procmacros::BuilderLite
in order to automatically implement the Builder Lite pattern for them.
- The driver's constructor should take the config struct by value, and it should return
- If a driver only supports a single peripheral instance, no instance type parameter is necessary.
- If a driver implements both blocking and async operations, or only implements blocking operations, but may support asynchronous ones in the future, the driver's type signature must include a
crate::Mode
type parameter. - By default, constructors must configure the driver for blocking mode. The driver must implement
into_async
(and a matchinginto_blocking
) function that reconfigures the driver.into_async
must configure the driver and/or the associated DMA channels. This most often means enabling an interrupt handler.into_blocking
must undo the configuration done byinto_async
.
- The asynchronous driver implementation must also expose the blocking methods (except for interrupt related functions).
- Drivers must have a
Drop
implementation resetting the peripheral to idle state. There are some exceptions to this:- GPIO where common usage is to "set and drop" so they can't be changed
- Where we don't want to disable the peripheral as it's used internally, for example SYSTIMER is used by
time::now()
API. SeeKEEP_ENABLED
in src/system.rs - A driver doesn't need to do anything special for deinitialization and has a
PeripheralGuard
field which implements the disabling and resetting of the peripheral.
- Consider using a builder-like pattern for driver construction.
- Don't use
log::XXX!
macros directly - use the wrappers infmt.rs
(e.g. justinfo!
instead oflog::info!
or importinglog::*
)! - Consider implementing common ecosystem traits, like the ones in
embedded-hal
orembassy-embedded-hal
.- Where the guidelines suggest implementing
Debug
,defmt::Format
should also be implemented.- The
defmt::Format
implementation needs to be gated behind thedefmt
feature. - see this example
- e.g.
#[cfg_attr(feature = "defmt", derive(defmt::Format))]
- The
- Implementations of common, but unstable traits (e.g.
embassy_embedded_hal::SetConfig
) need to be gated with theunstable
feature.
- Where the guidelines suggest implementing
- API documentation must be provided for every new driver and API.
- Private details should not leak into the public API, and should be made private where technically possible.
- Implementation details that need to be public should be marked with
#[doc(hidden)]
and a comment as to why it needs to be public. - Functions which technically need to be public but shouldn't be callable by the user need to be sealed.
- Implementation details that need to be public should be marked with
- Any public traits, that must not be implemented downstream need to be
Sealed
. - Prefer compile-time checks over runtime checks where possible, prefer a fallible API over panics.
- Follow naming conventions in order to be consistent across drivers - take inspiration from existing drivers.
- Design APIs in a way that they are easy to use.
- Driver API decisions should be assessed individually, don't not just follow embedded-hal or other ecosystem trait crates. Expose the capabilities of the hardware. (Ecosystem traits are implemented on top of the inherent API)
- Avoid type states and extraneous generics whenever possible
- These often lead to usability problems, and tend to just complicate things needlessly - sometimes it can be a good tradeoff to make a type not ZST
- Common cases of useless type info is storing pin information - this is usually not required after configuring the pins and will bloat the complexity of the type massively. When following the
PeripheralRef
pattern it's not needed in order to keep users from re-using the pin while in use
- Avoiding
&mut self
when&self
is safe to use.&self
is generally easier to use as an API. Typical applications of this are where the methods just do writes to registers which don't have side effects. - Maintain order consistency in the API, such as in the case of pairs like RX/TX.
- If your driver provides a way to listen for interrupts, the interrupts should be listed in a
derive(EnumSetType)
enum as opposed to one function per interrupt flag. - If a driver only implements a subset of a peripheral's capabilities, it should be placed in the
peripheral::subcategory
module.- For example, if a driver implements the slave-mode I2C driver, it should be placed into
i2c::slave
. - This helps us reducing the need of introducing breaking changes if we implement additional functionalities.
- For example, if a driver implements the slave-mode I2C driver, it should be placed into
- Avoid excessive use of macros unless there is no other option; modification of the PAC crates should be considered before resorting to macros.
- Every line of code is a liability. Take some time to see if your implementation can be simplified before opening a PR.
- If you are porting code from ESP-IDF (or anything else), please include a link WITH the commit hash in it, and please highlight the relevant line(s) of code
- If necessary provide further context as comments (consider linking to code, PRs, TRM - make sure to use permanent links, e.g. include the hash when linking to a Git repository, include the revision, page number etc. when linking to TRMs)
- Prefer line comments (//) to block comments (/* ... */)
- Generally, follow common "good practices" and idiomatic Rust style
- All
Future
objects (public or private) must be marked with#[must_use = "futures do nothing unless you `.await` or poll them"]
. - Prefer
cfg_if!
(or, if the branches just pick between separate values of the same variable,cfg!()
) over multiple exclusive#[cfg]
attributes.cfg_if!
/cfg!()
visually divide the options, often results in simpler conditions and simplifies adding new branches in the future.
- If a common
Instance
trait is used for multiple peripherals, those traits should not have any logic implemented in them. - The
Instance
traits should only be used to access information about a peripheral instance. - The internal implementation of the driver should be non-generic over the peripheral instance. This helps the compiler produce smaller code.
- The author is encouraged to return a static shared reference to an
Info
and aState
structure from theInstance
trait.- The
Info
struct should describe the peripheral. Do not use any interior mutability. - The
State
struct should contain counters, wakers and other, mutable state. As this is accessed via a shared reference, interior mutability and atomic variables are preferred.
- The
Modules should have the following documentation format:
//! # Peripheral Name (Peripheral Acronym)
//!
//! ## Overview
//! Small description of the peripheral, see ESP-IDF docs or TRM
//!
//! ## Configuration
//! Explain how can the peripheral be configured, and which parameters can be configured
//!
//! ## Usage
//! Explain if we implement any external traits
//!
//! ## Examples
//!
//! ### Name of the Example
//! Small description of the example if needed
//! ```rust, no_run
//! ...
//! ```
//!
//! ## Implementation State
//! List unsupported features
- If any of the headers is empty, remove it
- When possible, use ESP-IDF docs and TRM as references and include links if possible.
- In case of referencing an ESP-IDF link make it chip-specific, for example:
#![doc = concat!("[ESP-IDF documentation](https://docs.espressif.com/projects/esp-idf/en/latest/", crate::soc::chip!(), "/api-reference/peripherals/etm.html)")]
- In case of referencing a TRM chapter, use the
crate::trm_markdown_link!()
macro. If you are referring to a particular chapter, you may usecrate::trm_markdown_link!("#chapter_anchor")
.
- In case of referencing an ESP-IDF link make it chip-specific, for example:
- Documentation examples must be short
- But must also provide value beyond what the rustdoc generated docs show
- Showing a snippet of a slightly more complex interaction, for example inverting the signals for a driver
- Showing construction if it is more complex, or requires some non-obvious precursor steps. Think about this for drivers that take a generic instance to construct, rustdoc doesn't do a good job of showing what concrete things can be passed into a constructor.
- For more complex scenarios, create an example.
- But must also provide value beyond what the rustdoc generated docs show
- Use rustdoc syntax for linking to other documentation items instead of markdown links where possible