Sunplus SP7021 (Plus1) pin multiplexer and GPIO controller
The pin multiplexer and GPIO block inside Sunplus's SP7021 (also sold as the Tibbo Plus1) system-on-chip, an ARM Cortex-A7 Linux SoC aimed at IoT gateways and industrial control boards. It tells the chip which external pins act as GPIOs versus dedicated peripheral signals such as UART, SPI, or I2C.
recommendation
It should stay because the SP7021 system-on-chip it supports is still being sold in 2025 by Sunplus and by Tibbo, whose Plus1-branded industrial Linux boards carry a ten-year supply guarantee. Upstream activity is recent (a substantive change landed in September 2025) and there is no alternative driver for this SoC-specific pin controller, so removing it would break a small but live embedded ecosystem.
repository signals
sources
- git.kernel.org
Upstream Kconfig identifies this as the "Sunplus SP7021 PinMux and GPIO driver" and ties it to CONFIG_SOC_SP7021.
- git.kernel.org
The directory has continued upstream activity through 2025-2026 and shows no obvious removal/deprecation series in the path history.
- git.kernel.org
A substantive pinctrl-related touch landed on 2025-09-08, indicating the driver is still maintained rather than abandoned.
- sunplus.com
Sunplus markets SP7021 as a current Linux SoC for IoT and industrial control applications.
- tibbo.com
Tibbo was still marketing the Plus1/SP7021 platform with ordering language and a ten-year supply guarantee.
- tibbo.com
A current Tibbo board product page lists an SP7021-based Linux PCB, showing ongoing real-world deployment in embedded/industrial products.
codex reasoning notes (technical)
Real driver directory: local shell inspection showed builtin_platform_driver plus OF match for "sunplus,sp7021-pctl". Kernel.org tree/log/commit URLs were added by canonical recall after shell inspection and local git history review; the path log shows recent maintenance and no removal discussion on the directory history. Sunplus and Tibbo URLs were obtained via web search and show the SP7021/Plus1 family still being sold for embedded industrial use in 2025-era materials. Deployment is therefore current but niche rather than broad-purpose, so keep rather than deprecate; there is no natural replacement driver for this SoC-specific pinctrl block.