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X86 MIPI camera HW-enablement

Summary

Add support for more MIPI (non USB) cameras found on x86 laptops and tablets.

Owner

Current status

  • Targeted release: Fedora Linux 42
  • Last updated: 2025-01-14
  • [<link to devel-announce post will be added by Wrangler> Announced]
  • [<will be assigned by the Wrangler> Discussion thread]
  • FESCo issue: <will be assigned by the Wrangler>
  • Tracker bug: <will be assigned by the Wrangler>
  • Release notes tracker: <will be assigned by the Wrangler>


Detailed Description

The initial IPU6 camera support landed in Fedora 41 only works on a limited set of laptops.

The reason for this is that with MIPI cameras every different sensor and glue-chip like IO-expanders needs to be supported separately.

This change is about the ongoing work to get the camera working on more laptop models.

This is being tracked on a per sensor and/or laptop-model basis. Currently the following issues are being either actively being worked on, or are being tracked to be fixed in the future:

Feedback

Benefit to Fedora

Currently on many new laptop models the camera does not work OOTB in Fedora, the goal of this change is to get the camera to work OOTB on more laptop models.

Scope

  • Proposal owners:
    • This mainly requires kernel changes, most of this work is being done upstream. Depending on the timing some changes accepted upstream may be backported to the Fedora kernel used for the Fedora 42 release.
    • Some libcamera changes may be necessary
  • Other developers: N/A (not a System Wide Change)
  • Release engineering: N/A (not a System Wide Change)
  • Policies and guidelines: N/A (not needed for this Change)
  • Trademark approval: N/A (not needed for this Change)
  • Alignment with the Fedora Strategy: Yes (better hw-support should help getting more users)

Upgrade/compatibility impact

Since the improvements will be part of the kernel and libcamera all users will get these as part of the Fedora 42 upgrade.

How To Test

User Experience

The camera on X86 laptops with MIPI cameras should work OOTB on more laptop models.

Dependencies

None

Contingency Plan

ATM IPU6 cameras do not work at all on many laptop models. Except for the changes actually causing regressions no contingency plan is necessary. As always with kernel changes any known regressions will be fixes ASAP or the change causing the regression will be reverted.

Documentation

N/A (not a System Wide Change)

Release Notes

To be written...