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Documentation / video4linux / v4l2-controls.txt




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Based on kernel version 3.4. Page generated on 2012-05-21 22:13 EST.

1	Introduction
2	============
3	
4	The V4L2 control API seems simple enough, but quickly becomes very hard to
5	implement correctly in drivers. But much of the code needed to handle controls
6	is actually not driver specific and can be moved to the V4L core framework.
7	
8	After all, the only part that a driver developer is interested in is:
9	
10	1) How do I add a control?
11	2) How do I set the control's value? (i.e. s_ctrl)
12	
13	And occasionally:
14	
15	3) How do I get the control's value? (i.e. g_volatile_ctrl)
16	4) How do I validate the user's proposed control value? (i.e. try_ctrl)
17	
18	All the rest is something that can be done centrally.
19	
20	The control framework was created in order to implement all the rules of the
21	V4L2 specification with respect to controls in a central place. And to make
22	life as easy as possible for the driver developer.
23	
24	Note that the control framework relies on the presence of a struct v4l2_device
25	for V4L2 drivers and struct v4l2_subdev for sub-device drivers.
26	
27	
28	Objects in the framework
29	========================
30	
31	There are two main objects:
32	
33	The v4l2_ctrl object describes the control properties and keeps track of the
34	control's value (both the current value and the proposed new value).
35	
36	v4l2_ctrl_handler is the object that keeps track of controls. It maintains a
37	list of v4l2_ctrl objects that it owns and another list of references to
38	controls, possibly to controls owned by other handlers.
39	
40	
41	Basic usage for V4L2 and sub-device drivers
42	===========================================
43	
44	1) Prepare the driver:
45	
46	1.1) Add the handler to your driver's top-level struct:
47	
48		struct foo_dev {
49			...
50			struct v4l2_ctrl_handler ctrl_handler;
51			...
52		};
53	
54		struct foo_dev *foo;
55	
56	1.2) Initialize the handler:
57	
58		v4l2_ctrl_handler_init(&foo->ctrl_handler, nr_of_controls);
59	
60	  The second argument is a hint telling the function how many controls this
61	  handler is expected to handle. It will allocate a hashtable based on this
62	  information. It is a hint only.
63	
64	1.3) Hook the control handler into the driver:
65	
66	1.3.1) For V4L2 drivers do this:
67	
68		struct foo_dev {
69			...
70			struct v4l2_device v4l2_dev;
71			...
72			struct v4l2_ctrl_handler ctrl_handler;
73			...
74		};
75	
76		foo->v4l2_dev.ctrl_handler = &foo->ctrl_handler;
77	
78	  Where foo->v4l2_dev is of type struct v4l2_device.
79	
80	  Finally, remove all control functions from your v4l2_ioctl_ops:
81	  vidioc_queryctrl, vidioc_querymenu, vidioc_g_ctrl, vidioc_s_ctrl,
82	  vidioc_g_ext_ctrls, vidioc_try_ext_ctrls and vidioc_s_ext_ctrls.
83	  Those are now no longer needed.
84	
85	1.3.2) For sub-device drivers do this:
86	
87		struct foo_dev {
88			...
89			struct v4l2_subdev sd;
90			...
91			struct v4l2_ctrl_handler ctrl_handler;
92			...
93		};
94	
95		foo->sd.ctrl_handler = &foo->ctrl_handler;
96	
97	  Where foo->sd is of type struct v4l2_subdev.
98	
99	  And set all core control ops in your struct v4l2_subdev_core_ops to these
100	  helpers:
101	
102		.queryctrl = v4l2_subdev_queryctrl,
103		.querymenu = v4l2_subdev_querymenu,
104		.g_ctrl = v4l2_subdev_g_ctrl,
105		.s_ctrl = v4l2_subdev_s_ctrl,
106		.g_ext_ctrls = v4l2_subdev_g_ext_ctrls,
107		.try_ext_ctrls = v4l2_subdev_try_ext_ctrls,
108		.s_ext_ctrls = v4l2_subdev_s_ext_ctrls,
109	
110	  Note: this is a temporary solution only. Once all V4L2 drivers that depend
111	  on subdev drivers are converted to the control framework these helpers will
112	  no longer be needed.
113	
114	1.4) Clean up the handler at the end:
115	
116		v4l2_ctrl_handler_free(&foo->ctrl_handler);
117	
118	
119	2) Add controls:
120	
121	You add non-menu controls by calling v4l2_ctrl_new_std:
122	
123		struct v4l2_ctrl *v4l2_ctrl_new_std(struct v4l2_ctrl_handler *hdl,
124				const struct v4l2_ctrl_ops *ops,
125				u32 id, s32 min, s32 max, u32 step, s32 def);
126	
127	Menu controls are added by calling v4l2_ctrl_new_std_menu:
128	
129		struct v4l2_ctrl *v4l2_ctrl_new_std_menu(struct v4l2_ctrl_handler *hdl,
130				const struct v4l2_ctrl_ops *ops,
131				u32 id, s32 max, s32 skip_mask, s32 def);
132	
133	These functions are typically called right after the v4l2_ctrl_handler_init:
134	
135		v4l2_ctrl_handler_init(&foo->ctrl_handler, nr_of_controls);
136		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&foo->ctrl_handler, &foo_ctrl_ops,
137				V4L2_CID_BRIGHTNESS, 0, 255, 1, 128);
138		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&foo->ctrl_handler, &foo_ctrl_ops,
139				V4L2_CID_CONTRAST, 0, 255, 1, 128);
140		v4l2_ctrl_new_std_menu(&foo->ctrl_handler, &foo_ctrl_ops,
141				V4L2_CID_POWER_LINE_FREQUENCY,
142				V4L2_CID_POWER_LINE_FREQUENCY_60HZ, 0,
143				V4L2_CID_POWER_LINE_FREQUENCY_DISABLED);
144		...
145		if (foo->ctrl_handler.error) {
146			int err = foo->ctrl_handler.error;
147	
148			v4l2_ctrl_handler_free(&foo->ctrl_handler);
149			return err;
150		}
151	
152	The v4l2_ctrl_new_std function returns the v4l2_ctrl pointer to the new
153	control, but if you do not need to access the pointer outside the control ops,
154	then there is no need to store it.
155	
156	The v4l2_ctrl_new_std function will fill in most fields based on the control
157	ID except for the min, max, step and default values. These are passed in the
158	last four arguments. These values are driver specific while control attributes
159	like type, name, flags are all global. The control's current value will be set
160	to the default value.
161	
162	The v4l2_ctrl_new_std_menu function is very similar but it is used for menu
163	controls. There is no min argument since that is always 0 for menu controls,
164	and instead of a step there is a skip_mask argument: if bit X is 1, then menu
165	item X is skipped.
166	
167	Note that if something fails, the function will return NULL or an error and
168	set ctrl_handler->error to the error code. If ctrl_handler->error was already
169	set, then it will just return and do nothing. This is also true for
170	v4l2_ctrl_handler_init if it cannot allocate the internal data structure.
171	
172	This makes it easy to init the handler and just add all controls and only check
173	the error code at the end. Saves a lot of repetitive error checking.
174	
175	It is recommended to add controls in ascending control ID order: it will be
176	a bit faster that way.
177	
178	3) Optionally force initial control setup:
179	
180		v4l2_ctrl_handler_setup(&foo->ctrl_handler);
181	
182	This will call s_ctrl for all controls unconditionally. Effectively this
183	initializes the hardware to the default control values. It is recommended
184	that you do this as this ensures that both the internal data structures and
185	the hardware are in sync.
186	
187	4) Finally: implement the v4l2_ctrl_ops
188	
189		static const struct v4l2_ctrl_ops foo_ctrl_ops = {
190			.s_ctrl = foo_s_ctrl,
191		};
192	
193	Usually all you need is s_ctrl:
194	
195		static int foo_s_ctrl(struct v4l2_ctrl *ctrl)
196		{
197			struct foo *state = container_of(ctrl->handler, struct foo, ctrl_handler);
198	
199			switch (ctrl->id) {
200			case V4L2_CID_BRIGHTNESS:
201				write_reg(0x123, ctrl->val);
202				break;
203			case V4L2_CID_CONTRAST:
204				write_reg(0x456, ctrl->val);
205				break;
206			}
207			return 0;
208		}
209	
210	The control ops are called with the v4l2_ctrl pointer as argument.
211	The new control value has already been validated, so all you need to do is
212	to actually update the hardware registers.
213	
214	You're done! And this is sufficient for most of the drivers we have. No need
215	to do any validation of control values, or implement QUERYCTRL/QUERYMENU. And
216	G/S_CTRL as well as G/TRY/S_EXT_CTRLS are automatically supported.
217	
218	
219	==============================================================================
220	
221	The remainder of this document deals with more advanced topics and scenarios.
222	In practice the basic usage as described above is sufficient for most drivers.
223	
224	===============================================================================
225	
226	
227	Inheriting Controls
228	===================
229	
230	When a sub-device is registered with a V4L2 driver by calling
231	v4l2_device_register_subdev() and the ctrl_handler fields of both v4l2_subdev
232	and v4l2_device are set, then the controls of the subdev will become
233	automatically available in the V4L2 driver as well. If the subdev driver
234	contains controls that already exist in the V4L2 driver, then those will be
235	skipped (so a V4L2 driver can always override a subdev control).
236	
237	What happens here is that v4l2_device_register_subdev() calls
238	v4l2_ctrl_add_handler() adding the controls of the subdev to the controls
239	of v4l2_device.
240	
241	
242	Accessing Control Values
243	========================
244	
245	The v4l2_ctrl struct contains these two unions:
246	
247		/* The current control value. */
248		union {
249			s32 val;
250			s64 val64;
251			char *string;
252		} cur;
253	
254		/* The new control value. */
255		union {
256			s32 val;
257			s64 val64;
258			char *string;
259		};
260	
261	Within the control ops you can freely use these. The val and val64 speak for
262	themselves. The string pointers point to character buffers of length
263	ctrl->maximum + 1, and are always 0-terminated.
264	
265	In most cases 'cur' contains the current cached control value. When you create
266	a new control this value is made identical to the default value. After calling
267	v4l2_ctrl_handler_setup() this value is passed to the hardware. It is generally
268	a good idea to call this function.
269	
270	Whenever a new value is set that new value is automatically cached. This means
271	that most drivers do not need to implement the g_volatile_ctrl() op. The
272	exception is for controls that return a volatile register such as a signal
273	strength read-out that changes continuously. In that case you will need to
274	implement g_volatile_ctrl like this:
275	
276		static int foo_g_volatile_ctrl(struct v4l2_ctrl *ctrl)
277		{
278			switch (ctrl->id) {
279			case V4L2_CID_BRIGHTNESS:
280				ctrl->val = read_reg(0x123);
281				break;
282			}
283		}
284	
285	Note that you use the 'new value' union as well in g_volatile_ctrl. In general
286	controls that need to implement g_volatile_ctrl are read-only controls.
287	
288	To mark a control as volatile you have to set V4L2_CTRL_FLAG_VOLATILE:
289	
290		ctrl = v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&sd->ctrl_handler, ...);
291		if (ctrl)
292			ctrl->flags |= V4L2_CTRL_FLAG_VOLATILE;
293	
294	For try/s_ctrl the new values (i.e. as passed by the user) are filled in and
295	you can modify them in try_ctrl or set them in s_ctrl. The 'cur' union
296	contains the current value, which you can use (but not change!) as well.
297	
298	If s_ctrl returns 0 (OK), then the control framework will copy the new final
299	values to the 'cur' union.
300	
301	While in g_volatile/s/try_ctrl you can access the value of all controls owned
302	by the same handler since the handler's lock is held. If you need to access
303	the value of controls owned by other handlers, then you have to be very careful
304	not to introduce deadlocks.
305	
306	Outside of the control ops you have to go through to helper functions to get
307	or set a single control value safely in your driver:
308	
309		s32 v4l2_ctrl_g_ctrl(struct v4l2_ctrl *ctrl);
310		int v4l2_ctrl_s_ctrl(struct v4l2_ctrl *ctrl, s32 val);
311	
312	These functions go through the control framework just as VIDIOC_G/S_CTRL ioctls
313	do. Don't use these inside the control ops g_volatile/s/try_ctrl, though, that
314	will result in a deadlock since these helpers lock the handler as well.
315	
316	You can also take the handler lock yourself:
317	
318		mutex_lock(&state->ctrl_handler.lock);
319		printk(KERN_INFO "String value is '%s'\n", ctrl1->cur.string);
320		printk(KERN_INFO "Integer value is '%s'\n", ctrl2->cur.val);
321		mutex_unlock(&state->ctrl_handler.lock);
322	
323	
324	Menu Controls
325	=============
326	
327	The v4l2_ctrl struct contains this union:
328	
329		union {
330			u32 step;
331			u32 menu_skip_mask;
332		};
333	
334	For menu controls menu_skip_mask is used. What it does is that it allows you
335	to easily exclude certain menu items. This is used in the VIDIOC_QUERYMENU
336	implementation where you can return -EINVAL if a certain menu item is not
337	present. Note that VIDIOC_QUERYCTRL always returns a step value of 1 for
338	menu controls.
339	
340	A good example is the MPEG Audio Layer II Bitrate menu control where the
341	menu is a list of standardized possible bitrates. But in practice hardware
342	implementations will only support a subset of those. By setting the skip
343	mask you can tell the framework which menu items should be skipped. Setting
344	it to 0 means that all menu items are supported.
345	
346	You set this mask either through the v4l2_ctrl_config struct for a custom
347	control, or by calling v4l2_ctrl_new_std_menu().
348	
349	
350	Custom Controls
351	===============
352	
353	Driver specific controls can be created using v4l2_ctrl_new_custom():
354	
355		static const struct v4l2_ctrl_config ctrl_filter = {
356			.ops = &ctrl_custom_ops,
357			.id = V4L2_CID_MPEG_CX2341X_VIDEO_SPATIAL_FILTER,
358			.name = "Spatial Filter",
359			.type = V4L2_CTRL_TYPE_INTEGER,
360			.flags = V4L2_CTRL_FLAG_SLIDER,
361			.max = 15,
362			.step = 1,
363		};
364	
365		ctrl = v4l2_ctrl_new_custom(&foo->ctrl_handler, &ctrl_filter, NULL);
366	
367	The last argument is the priv pointer which can be set to driver-specific
368	private data.
369	
370	The v4l2_ctrl_config struct also has a field to set the is_private flag.
371	
372	If the name field is not set, then the framework will assume this is a standard
373	control and will fill in the name, type and flags fields accordingly.
374	
375	
376	Active and Grabbed Controls
377	===========================
378	
379	If you get more complex relationships between controls, then you may have to
380	activate and deactivate controls. For example, if the Chroma AGC control is
381	on, then the Chroma Gain control is inactive. That is, you may set it, but
382	the value will not be used by the hardware as long as the automatic gain
383	control is on. Typically user interfaces can disable such input fields.
384	
385	You can set the 'active' status using v4l2_ctrl_activate(). By default all
386	controls are active. Note that the framework does not check for this flag.
387	It is meant purely for GUIs. The function is typically called from within
388	s_ctrl.
389	
390	The other flag is the 'grabbed' flag. A grabbed control means that you cannot
391	change it because it is in use by some resource. Typical examples are MPEG
392	bitrate controls that cannot be changed while capturing is in progress.
393	
394	If a control is set to 'grabbed' using v4l2_ctrl_grab(), then the framework
395	will return -EBUSY if an attempt is made to set this control. The
396	v4l2_ctrl_grab() function is typically called from the driver when it
397	starts or stops streaming.
398	
399	
400	Control Clusters
401	================
402	
403	By default all controls are independent from the others. But in more
404	complex scenarios you can get dependencies from one control to another.
405	In that case you need to 'cluster' them:
406	
407		struct foo {
408			struct v4l2_ctrl_handler ctrl_handler;
409	#define AUDIO_CL_VOLUME (0)
410	#define AUDIO_CL_MUTE   (1)
411			struct v4l2_ctrl *audio_cluster[2];
412			...
413		};
414	
415		state->audio_cluster[AUDIO_CL_VOLUME] =
416			v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&state->ctrl_handler, ...);
417		state->audio_cluster[AUDIO_CL_MUTE] =
418			v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&state->ctrl_handler, ...);
419		v4l2_ctrl_cluster(ARRAY_SIZE(state->audio_cluster), state->audio_cluster);
420	
421	From now on whenever one or more of the controls belonging to the same
422	cluster is set (or 'gotten', or 'tried'), only the control ops of the first
423	control ('volume' in this example) is called. You effectively create a new
424	composite control. Similar to how a 'struct' works in C.
425	
426	So when s_ctrl is called with V4L2_CID_AUDIO_VOLUME as argument, you should set
427	all two controls belonging to the audio_cluster:
428	
429		static int foo_s_ctrl(struct v4l2_ctrl *ctrl)
430		{
431			struct foo *state = container_of(ctrl->handler, struct foo, ctrl_handler);
432	
433			switch (ctrl->id) {
434			case V4L2_CID_AUDIO_VOLUME: {
435				struct v4l2_ctrl *mute = ctrl->cluster[AUDIO_CL_MUTE];
436	
437				write_reg(0x123, mute->val ? 0 : ctrl->val);
438				break;
439			}
440			case V4L2_CID_CONTRAST:
441				write_reg(0x456, ctrl->val);
442				break;
443			}
444			return 0;
445		}
446	
447	In the example above the following are equivalent for the VOLUME case:
448	
449		ctrl == ctrl->cluster[AUDIO_CL_VOLUME] == state->audio_cluster[AUDIO_CL_VOLUME]
450		ctrl->cluster[AUDIO_CL_MUTE] == state->audio_cluster[AUDIO_CL_MUTE]
451	
452	In practice using cluster arrays like this becomes very tiresome. So instead
453	the following equivalent method is used:
454	
455		struct {
456			/* audio cluster */
457			struct v4l2_ctrl *volume;
458			struct v4l2_ctrl *mute;
459		};
460	
461	The anonymous struct is used to clearly 'cluster' these two control pointers,
462	but it serves no other purpose. The effect is the same as creating an
463	array with two control pointers. So you can just do:
464	
465		state->volume = v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&state->ctrl_handler, ...);
466		state->mute = v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&state->ctrl_handler, ...);
467		v4l2_ctrl_cluster(2, &state->volume);
468	
469	And in foo_s_ctrl you can use these pointers directly: state->mute->val.
470	
471	Note that controls in a cluster may be NULL. For example, if for some
472	reason mute was never added (because the hardware doesn't support that
473	particular feature), then mute will be NULL. So in that case we have a
474	cluster of 2 controls, of which only 1 is actually instantiated. The
475	only restriction is that the first control of the cluster must always be
476	present, since that is the 'master' control of the cluster. The master
477	control is the one that identifies the cluster and that provides the
478	pointer to the v4l2_ctrl_ops struct that is used for that cluster.
479	
480	Obviously, all controls in the cluster array must be initialized to either
481	a valid control or to NULL.
482	
483	In rare cases you might want to know which controls of a cluster actually
484	were set explicitly by the user. For this you can check the 'is_new' flag of
485	each control. For example, in the case of a volume/mute cluster the 'is_new'
486	flag of the mute control would be set if the user called VIDIOC_S_CTRL for
487	mute only. If the user would call VIDIOC_S_EXT_CTRLS for both mute and volume
488	controls, then the 'is_new' flag would be 1 for both controls.
489	
490	The 'is_new' flag is always 1 when called from v4l2_ctrl_handler_setup().
491	
492	
493	Handling autogain/gain-type Controls with Auto Clusters
494	=======================================================
495	
496	A common type of control cluster is one that handles 'auto-foo/foo'-type
497	controls. Typical examples are autogain/gain, autoexposure/exposure,
498	autowhitebalance/red balance/blue balance. In all cases you have one control
499	that determines whether another control is handled automatically by the hardware,
500	or whether it is under manual control from the user.
501	
502	If the cluster is in automatic mode, then the manual controls should be
503	marked inactive and volatile. When the volatile controls are read the
504	g_volatile_ctrl operation should return the value that the hardware's automatic
505	mode set up automatically.
506	
507	If the cluster is put in manual mode, then the manual controls should become
508	active again and the volatile flag is cleared (so g_volatile_ctrl is no longer
509	called while in manual mode). In addition just before switching to manual mode
510	the current values as determined by the auto mode are copied as the new manual
511	values.
512	
513	Finally the V4L2_CTRL_FLAG_UPDATE should be set for the auto control since
514	changing that control affects the control flags of the manual controls.
515	
516	In order to simplify this a special variation of v4l2_ctrl_cluster was
517	introduced:
518	
519	void v4l2_ctrl_auto_cluster(unsigned ncontrols, struct v4l2_ctrl **controls,
520				u8 manual_val, bool set_volatile);
521	
522	The first two arguments are identical to v4l2_ctrl_cluster. The third argument
523	tells the framework which value switches the cluster into manual mode. The
524	last argument will optionally set V4L2_CTRL_FLAG_VOLATILE for the non-auto controls.
525	If it is false, then the manual controls are never volatile. You would typically
526	use that if the hardware does not give you the option to read back to values as
527	determined by the auto mode (e.g. if autogain is on, the hardware doesn't allow
528	you to obtain the current gain value).
529	
530	The first control of the cluster is assumed to be the 'auto' control.
531	
532	Using this function will ensure that you don't need to handle all the complex
533	flag and volatile handling.
534	
535	
536	VIDIOC_LOG_STATUS Support
537	=========================
538	
539	This ioctl allow you to dump the current status of a driver to the kernel log.
540	The v4l2_ctrl_handler_log_status(ctrl_handler, prefix) can be used to dump the
541	value of the controls owned by the given handler to the log. You can supply a
542	prefix as well. If the prefix didn't end with a space, then ': ' will be added
543	for you.
544	
545	
546	Different Handlers for Different Video Nodes
547	============================================
548	
549	Usually the V4L2 driver has just one control handler that is global for
550	all video nodes. But you can also specify different control handlers for
551	different video nodes. You can do that by manually setting the ctrl_handler
552	field of struct video_device.
553	
554	That is no problem if there are no subdevs involved but if there are, then
555	you need to block the automatic merging of subdev controls to the global
556	control handler. You do that by simply setting the ctrl_handler field in
557	struct v4l2_device to NULL. Now v4l2_device_register_subdev() will no longer
558	merge subdev controls.
559	
560	After each subdev was added, you will then have to call v4l2_ctrl_add_handler
561	manually to add the subdev's control handler (sd->ctrl_handler) to the desired
562	control handler. This control handler may be specific to the video_device or
563	for a subset of video_device's. For example: the radio device nodes only have
564	audio controls, while the video and vbi device nodes share the same control
565	handler for the audio and video controls.
566	
567	If you want to have one handler (e.g. for a radio device node) have a subset
568	of another handler (e.g. for a video device node), then you should first add
569	the controls to the first handler, add the other controls to the second
570	handler and finally add the first handler to the second. For example:
571	
572		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&radio_ctrl_handler, &radio_ops, V4L2_CID_AUDIO_VOLUME, ...);
573		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&radio_ctrl_handler, &radio_ops, V4L2_CID_AUDIO_MUTE, ...);
574		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&video_ctrl_handler, &video_ops, V4L2_CID_BRIGHTNESS, ...);
575		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&video_ctrl_handler, &video_ops, V4L2_CID_CONTRAST, ...);
576		v4l2_ctrl_add_handler(&video_ctrl_handler, &radio_ctrl_handler);
577	
578	Or you can add specific controls to a handler:
579	
580		volume = v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&video_ctrl_handler, &ops, V4L2_CID_AUDIO_VOLUME, ...);
581		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&video_ctrl_handler, &ops, V4L2_CID_BRIGHTNESS, ...);
582		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&video_ctrl_handler, &ops, V4L2_CID_CONTRAST, ...);
583		v4l2_ctrl_add_ctrl(&radio_ctrl_handler, volume);
584	
585	What you should not do is make two identical controls for two handlers.
586	For example:
587	
588		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&radio_ctrl_handler, &radio_ops, V4L2_CID_AUDIO_MUTE, ...);
589		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&video_ctrl_handler, &video_ops, V4L2_CID_AUDIO_MUTE, ...);
590	
591	This would be bad since muting the radio would not change the video mute
592	control. The rule is to have one control for each hardware 'knob' that you
593	can twiddle.
594	
595	
596	Finding Controls
597	================
598	
599	Normally you have created the controls yourself and you can store the struct
600	v4l2_ctrl pointer into your own struct.
601	
602	But sometimes you need to find a control from another handler that you do
603	not own. For example, if you have to find a volume control from a subdev.
604	
605	You can do that by calling v4l2_ctrl_find:
606	
607		struct v4l2_ctrl *volume;
608	
609		volume = v4l2_ctrl_find(sd->ctrl_handler, V4L2_CID_AUDIO_VOLUME);
610	
611	Since v4l2_ctrl_find will lock the handler you have to be careful where you
612	use it. For example, this is not a good idea:
613	
614		struct v4l2_ctrl_handler ctrl_handler;
615	
616		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&ctrl_handler, &video_ops, V4L2_CID_BRIGHTNESS, ...);
617		v4l2_ctrl_new_std(&ctrl_handler, &video_ops, V4L2_CID_CONTRAST, ...);
618	
619	...and in video_ops.s_ctrl:
620	
621		case V4L2_CID_BRIGHTNESS:
622			contrast = v4l2_find_ctrl(&ctrl_handler, V4L2_CID_CONTRAST);
623			...
624	
625	When s_ctrl is called by the framework the ctrl_handler.lock is already taken, so
626	attempting to find another control from the same handler will deadlock.
627	
628	It is recommended not to use this function from inside the control ops.
629	
630	
631	Inheriting Controls
632	===================
633	
634	When one control handler is added to another using v4l2_ctrl_add_handler, then
635	by default all controls from one are merged to the other. But a subdev might
636	have low-level controls that make sense for some advanced embedded system, but
637	not when it is used in consumer-level hardware. In that case you want to keep
638	those low-level controls local to the subdev. You can do this by simply
639	setting the 'is_private' flag of the control to 1:
640	
641		static const struct v4l2_ctrl_config ctrl_private = {
642			.ops = &ctrl_custom_ops,
643			.id = V4L2_CID_...,
644			.name = "Some Private Control",
645			.type = V4L2_CTRL_TYPE_INTEGER,
646			.max = 15,
647			.step = 1,
648			.is_private = 1,
649		};
650	
651		ctrl = v4l2_ctrl_new_custom(&foo->ctrl_handler, &ctrl_private, NULL);
652	
653	These controls will now be skipped when v4l2_ctrl_add_handler is called.
654	
655	
656	V4L2_CTRL_TYPE_CTRL_CLASS Controls
657	==================================
658	
659	Controls of this type can be used by GUIs to get the name of the control class.
660	A fully featured GUI can make a dialog with multiple tabs with each tab
661	containing the controls belonging to a particular control class. The name of
662	each tab can be found by querying a special control with ID <control class | 1>.
663	
664	Drivers do not have to care about this. The framework will automatically add
665	a control of this type whenever the first control belonging to a new control
666	class is added.
667	
668	
669	Proposals for Extensions
670	========================
671	
672	Some ideas for future extensions to the spec:
673	
674	1) Add a V4L2_CTRL_FLAG_HEX to have values shown as hexadecimal instead of
675	decimal. Useful for e.g. video_mute_yuv.
676	
677	2) It is possible to mark in the controls array which controls have been
678	successfully written and which failed by for example adding a bit to the
679	control ID. Not sure if it is worth the effort, though.
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