carplay

[AliHS1]

I was reading something about CarPlay, and I have to say, it's a really wonderful project.
Do you have any plans to continue and set up CarPlay?

[f-io]

I did some testing with this code and was able to use it successfully with CP 2.0 as well as CP 3.0.

After switching to Wi-Fi, the phone advertises a CarPlay endpoint via Bonjour. You can also set it to CarPlay Ultra, which should enable HEVC support (important for the Raspberry Pi 5). Unfortunately, the on-board Broadcom/Cypress/Infineon Wi-Fi on Raspberry Pi devices has poor WPA3-SAE support.

For everything other than the iAP session and some glue logic, I think a different language should be considered.

The iAP code feels basically complete. CarPlay is a vastly different problem.

There is CarPlay-related code on GitHub written in pure C that some people reference and wire up with GStreamer, but it is leaked Apple code, you can’t legally use it in an open-source project. That’s likely why you won’t find a fully working native CarPlay implementation on GitHub.

[AliHS1]

@f-io @wiomoc
Thanks a lot for your detailed explanation — that really helps clarify things 🙏

I’ve been experimenting with the iAP2 part myself, and your notes confirm a lot of what I’ve noticed.

From your experience, what do you think would be the next steps or main actions needed to move this project further — toward getting a fully working CarPlay implementation?

For example, do you think we should focus more on the video streaming side (e.g., GStreamer / HEVC integration) or on improving the iAP session and Bonjour logic first?

[f-io]

Importantly, iAP/iAP2 is only one piece of the CarPlay integration puzzle. iAP2 sessions aren’t limited to CarPlay, multiple device categories implement iAP2. For completeness, iAP2 doesn’t just run over Bluetooth, there’s also a requirement to support iAP2 tunneled over Wi-Fi for CarPlay.

In other words, CarPlay is just one use case that relies on this authentication and communication protocol. If you want to take the next step, you’ll likely need to rewrite the CarPlay component due to Apple’s IP/licensing restrictions.

Nevertheless, have a look at https://github.com/maaiika/Carplay , the code avoids external dependencies and is written in pure C for portability across architectures.

Put simply, this is still far from a working CarPlay integration.