V4L2 exposes parameters that influence buffers sizes through the format
ioctls (VIDIOC_G_FMT, VIDIOC_TRY_FMT, VIDIOC_S_FMT, and possibly
VIDIOC_G_SELECTION and VIDIOC_S_SELECTION). Other parameters not part of
the format structure may also influence buffer sizes or buffer layout in
general. One existing such parameter is rotation, which is implemented
by the V4L2_CID_ROTATE control and thus exposed through the V4L2 control
ioctls.

The interaction between those parameters and buffers is currently only
partially specified by the V4L2 API. In particular interactions between
controls and buffers isn't specified at all. The behaviour of the
VIDIOC_S_FMT and VIDIOC_S_SELECTION ioctls when buffers are allocated is
also not fully specified.

This patch clearly defines and documents the interactions between
formats, selections, controls and buffers.

The preparatory discussions for the documentation change considered
completely disallowing controls that change the buffer size or layout,
in favour of extending the format API with a new ioctl that would bundle
those controls with format information. The idea has been rejected, as
this would essentially be a restricted version of the upcoming request
API that wouldn't bring any additional value.

Another option we have considered was to mandate the use of the request
API to modify controls that influence buffer size or layout. This has
also been rejected on the grounds that requiring the request API to
change rotation even when streaming is stopped would significantly
complicate implementation of drivers and usage of the V4L2 API for
applications.

Applications will however be required to use the upcoming request API to
change at runtime formats or controls that influence the buffer size or
layout, because of the need to synchronize buffers with the formats and
controls. Otherwise there would be no way to interpret the content of a
buffer correctly.
Signed-off-by: Laurent Pinchart <laurent.pinchart+renesas@ideasonboard.com>
Acked-by: Sakari Ailus <sakari.ailus@linux.intel.com>
Acked-by: Hans Verkuil <hans.verkuil@cisco.com>
Signed-off-by: Mauro Carvalho Chehab <mchehab@s-opensource.com>