Linus rejects media Kconfig change exposing chip driver prompts

Linus Torvalds has objected to a media subsystem change already merged for Linux 7.4 that stopped hiding many I2C and SPI camera and helper chip drivers from ordinary kernel configuration menus.

The change, from Sakari Ailus, was meant to stop distributions from missing raw camera sensor support that is increasingly common in laptops. Before it, those options sat behind expert-only or ancillary-hide knobs, so a normal config pass never offered them. Ailus argued the new default simply aligned media sensors with how other driver classes are selected, after Arch Linux kernels omitted needed modules.

Torvalds called the result much worse. Kernel configuration is already the most annoying step for people who build their own kernels, he wrote, and prompting for random media drivers by chip ID is not acceptable because no sane user can answer those questions. Even a laptop owner with a real webcam will not know whether they need a driver for a legacy encoder part number. "In other words: don't ask questions that you know the user cannot answer. There was a REASON why those menus were hidden."

He asked for the options to be tucked again behind something like embedded-camera settings, themselves gated by expert mode if needed. Media maintainer Mauro Carvalho Chehab agreed the change rolled back a deliberate simplification that lets Kconfig decide what only a media expert can judge, while acknowledging the pressure from interchangeable sensors on newer Intel IPU hardware. Laurent Pinchart floated a narrower fix that would unhide only the section needed for Intel CVS rather than the broad ancillary set.

The pull itself also brought new sensor and bridge drivers, Intel IPU7/IPU8 work, and assorted V4L2 core fixes, and had already landed before the Kconfig dispute flared. The open question is how to keep laptop camera modules buildable for distros without forcing every custom-kernel builder through a quiz of obscure silicon names.