Sebastian Dröge | 990eeb2 | 2016-11-01 17:57:44 +0200 | [diff] [blame] | 1 | # GStreamer 1.10 Release Notes |
| 2 | |
| 3 | **GStreamer 1.10.0 was released on 1st November 2016.** |
| 4 | |
| 5 | The GStreamer team is proud to announce a new major feature release in the |
| 6 | stable 1.x API series of your favourite cross-platform multimedia framework! |
| 7 | |
| 8 | As always, this release is again packed with new features, bug fixes and other |
| 9 | improvements. |
| 10 | |
| 11 | See [https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/releases/1.10/][latest] for the latest |
| 12 | version of this document. |
| 13 | |
| 14 | *Last updated: Tuesday 1 Nov 2016, 15:00 UTC [(log)][gitlog]* |
| 15 | |
| 16 | [latest]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/releases/1.10/ |
| 17 | [gitlog]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/www/log/src/htdocs/releases/1.10/release-notes-1.10.md |
| 18 | |
| 19 | ## Introduction |
| 20 | |
| 21 | The GStreamer team is proud to announce a new major feature release in the |
| 22 | stable 1.x API series of your favourite cross-platform multimedia framework! |
| 23 | |
| 24 | As always, this release is again packed with new features, bug fixes and other |
| 25 | improvements. |
| 26 | |
| 27 | ## Highlights |
| 28 | |
| 29 | - Several convenience APIs have been added to make developers' lives easier |
| 30 | - A new `GstStream` API provides applications a more meaningful view of the |
| 31 | structure of streams, simplifying the process of dealing with media in |
| 32 | complex container formats |
| 33 | - Experimental `decodebin3` and `playbin3` elements which bring a number of |
| 34 | improvements which were hard to implement within `decodebin` and `playbin` |
| 35 | - A new `parsebin` element to automatically unpack and parse a stream, stopping |
| 36 | just short of decoding |
| 37 | - Experimental new `meson`-based build system, bringing faster build and much |
| 38 | better Windows support (including for building with Visual Studio) |
| 39 | - A new `gst-docs` module has been created, and we are in the process of moving |
| 40 | our documentation to a markdown-based format for easier maintenance and |
| 41 | updates |
| 42 | - A new `gst-examples` module has been create, which contains example |
| 43 | GStreamer applications and is expected to grow with many more examples in |
| 44 | the future |
| 45 | - Various OpenGL and OpenGL|ES-related fixes and improvements for greater |
| 46 | efficiency on desktop and mobile platforms, and Vulkan support on Wayland was |
| 47 | also added |
| 48 | - Extensive improvements to the VAAPI plugins for improved robustness and |
| 49 | efficiency |
| 50 | - Lots of fixes and improvements across the board, spanning RTP/RTSP, V4L2, |
| 51 | Bluetooth, audio conversion, echo cancellation, and more! |
| 52 | |
| 53 | ## Major new features and changes |
| 54 | |
| 55 | ### Noteworthy new API, features and other changes |
| 56 | |
| 57 | #### Core API additions |
| 58 | |
| 59 | ##### Receive property change notifications via bus messages |
| 60 | |
| 61 | New API was added to receive element property change notifications via |
| 62 | bus messages. So far, applications had to connect a callback to an element's |
| 63 | `notify::property-name` signal via the GObject API, which was inconvenient for |
| 64 | at least two reasons: one had to implement a signal callback function, and that |
| 65 | callback function would usually be called from one of the streaming threads, so |
| 66 | one had to marshal (send) any information gathered or pending requests to the |
| 67 | main application thread which was tedious and error-prone. |
| 68 | |
| 69 | Enter [`gst_element_add_property_notify_watch()`][notify-watch] and |
| 70 | [`gst_element_add_property_deep_notify_watch()`][deep-notify-watch] which will |
| 71 | watch for changes of a property on the specified element, either only for this |
| 72 | element or recursively for a whole bin or pipeline. Whenever such a |
| 73 | property change happens, a `GST_MESSAGE_PROPERTY_NOTIFY` message will be posted |
| 74 | on the pipeline bus with details of the element, the property and the new |
| 75 | property value, all of which can be retrieved later from the message in the |
| 76 | application via [`gst_message_parse_property_notify()`][parse-notify]. Unlike |
| 77 | the GstBus watch functions, this API does not rely on a running GLib main loop. |
| 78 | |
| 79 | The above can be used to be notified asynchronously of caps changes in the |
| 80 | pipeline, or volume changes on an audio sink element, for example. |
| 81 | |
| 82 | [notify-watch]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstElement.html#gst-element-add-property-notify-watch |
| 83 | [deep-notify-watch]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstElement.html#gst-element-add-property-deep-notify-watch |
| 84 | [parse-notify]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstMessage.html#gst-message-parse-property-notify |
| 85 | |
| 86 | ##### GstBin "deep" element-added and element-removed signals |
| 87 | |
| 88 | GstBin has gained `"deep-element-added"` and `"deep-element-removed"` signals |
| 89 | which makes it easier for applications and higher-level plugins to track when |
| 90 | elements are added or removed from a complex pipeline with multiple sub-bins. |
| 91 | |
| 92 | `playbin` makes use of this to implement the new `"element-setup"` signal which |
| 93 | can be used to configure elements as they are added to `playbin`, just like the |
| 94 | existing `"source-setup"` signal which can be used to configure the source |
| 95 | element created. |
| 96 | |
| 97 | ##### Error messages can contain additional structured details |
| 98 | |
| 99 | It is often useful to provide additional, structured information in error, |
| 100 | warning or info messages for applications (or higher-level elements) to make |
| 101 | intelligent decisions based on them. To allow this, error, warning and info |
| 102 | messages now have API for adding arbitrary additional information to them |
| 103 | using a `GstStructure`: |
| 104 | [`GST_ELEMENT_ERROR_WITH_DETAILS`][element-error-with-details] and |
| 105 | corresponding API for the other message types. |
| 106 | |
| 107 | This is now used e.g. by the new [`GST_ELEMENT_FLOW_ERROR`][element-flow-error] |
| 108 | API to include the actual flow error in the error message, and the |
| 109 | [souphttpsrc element][souphttpsrc-detailed-errors] to provide the HTTP |
| 110 | status code, and the URL (if any) to which a redirection has happened. |
| 111 | |
| 112 | [element-error-with-details]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstElement.html#GST-ELEMENT-ERROR-WITH-DETAILS:CAPS |
| 113 | [element-flow-error]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstElement.html#GST-ELEMENT-FLOW-ERROR:CAPS |
| 114 | [souphttpsrc-detailed-errors]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gst-plugins-good/tree/ext/soup/gstsouphttpsrc.c?id=60d30db912a1aedd743e66b9dcd2e21d71fbb24f#n1318 |
| 115 | |
| 116 | ##### Redirect messages have official API now |
| 117 | |
| 118 | Sometimes, elements need to redirect the current stream URL and tell the |
| 119 | application to proceed with this new URL, possibly using a different |
| 120 | protocol too (thus changing the pipeline configuration). Until now, this was |
| 121 | informally implemented using `ELEMENT` messages on the bus. |
| 122 | |
| 123 | Now this has been formalized in the form of a new `GST_MESSAGE_REDIRECT` message. |
| 124 | A new redirect message can be created using [`gst_message_new_redirect()`][new-redirect]. |
| 125 | If needed, multiple redirect locations can be specified by calling |
| 126 | [`gst_message_add_redirect_entry()`][add-redirect] to add further redirect |
| 127 | entries, all with metadata, so the application can decide which is |
| 128 | most suitable (e.g. depending on the bitrate tags). |
| 129 | |
| 130 | [new-redirect]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstMessage.html#gst-message-new-redirect |
| 131 | [add-redirect]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstMessage.html#gst-message-add-redirect-entry |
| 132 | |
| 133 | ##### New pad linking convenience functions that automatically create ghost pads |
| 134 | |
| 135 | New pad linking convenience functions were added: |
| 136 | [`gst_pad_link_maybe_ghosting()`][pad-maybe-ghost] and |
| 137 | [`gst_pad_link_maybe_ghosting_full()`][pad-maybe-ghost-full] which were |
| 138 | previously internal to GStreamer have now been exposed for general use. |
| 139 | |
| 140 | The existing pad link functions will refuse to link pads or elements at |
| 141 | different levels in the pipeline hierarchy, requiring the developer to |
| 142 | create ghost pads where necessary. These new utility functions will |
| 143 | automatically create ghostpads as needed when linking pads at different |
| 144 | levels of the hierarchy (e.g. from an element inside a bin to one that's at |
| 145 | the same level in the hierarchy as the bin, or in another bin). |
| 146 | |
| 147 | [pad-maybe-ghost]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstPad.html#gst-pad-link-maybe-ghosting |
| 148 | [pad-maybe-ghost-full]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstPad.html#gst-pad-link-maybe-ghosting-full |
| 149 | |
| 150 | ##### Miscellaneous |
| 151 | |
| 152 | Pad probes: IDLE and BLOCK probes now work slightly differently in pull mode, |
| 153 | so that push and pull mode have opposite scenarios for idle and blocking probes. |
| 154 | In push mode, it will block with some data type and IDLE won't have any data. |
| 155 | In pull mode, it will block _before_ getting a buffer and will be IDLE once some |
| 156 | data has been obtained. ([commit][commit-pad-probes], [bug][bug-pad-probes]) |
| 157 | |
| 158 | [commit-pad-probes]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gstreamer/commit/gst/gstpad.c?id=368ee8a336d0c868d81fdace54b24431a8b48cbf |
| 159 | [bug-pad-probes]: https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=761211 |
| 160 | |
| 161 | [`gst_parse_launch_full()`][parse-launch-full] can now be made to return a |
| 162 | `GstBin` instead of a top-level pipeline by passing the new |
| 163 | `GST_PARSE_FLAG_PLACE_IN_BIN` flag. |
| 164 | |
| 165 | [parse-launch-full]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/gstreamer-GstParse.html#gst-parse-launch-full |
| 166 | |
| 167 | The default GStreamer debug log handler can now be removed before |
| 168 | calling `gst_init()`, so that it will never get installed and won't be active |
| 169 | during initialization. |
| 170 | |
| 171 | A new [`STREAM_GROUP_DONE` event][stream-group-done-event] was added. In some |
| 172 | ways it works similar to the `EOS` event in that it can be used to unblock |
| 173 | downstream elements which may be waiting for further data, such as for example |
| 174 | `input-selector`. Unlike `EOS`, further data flow may happen after the |
| 175 | `STREAM_GROUP_DONE` event though (and without the need to flush the pipeline). |
| 176 | This is used to unblock input-selector when switching between streams in |
| 177 | adaptive streaming scenarios (e.g. HLS). |
| 178 | |
| 179 | [stream-group-done-event]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstEvent.html#gst-event-new-stream-group-done |
| 180 | |
| 181 | The `gst-launch-1.0` command line tool will now print unescaped caps in verbose |
| 182 | mode (enabled by the -v switch). |
| 183 | |
| 184 | [`gst_element_call_async()`][call-async] has been added as convenience API for |
| 185 | plugin developers. It is useful for one-shot operations that need to be done |
| 186 | from a thread other than the current streaming thread. It is backed by a |
| 187 | thread-pool that is shared by all elements. |
| 188 | |
| 189 | [call-async]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstElement.html#gst-element-call-async |
| 190 | |
| 191 | Various race conditions have been fixed around the `GstPoll` API used by e.g. |
| 192 | `GstBus` and `GstBufferPool`. Some of these manifested themselves primarily |
| 193 | on Windows. |
| 194 | |
| 195 | `GstAdapter` can now keep track of discontinuities signalled via the `DISCONT` |
| 196 | buffer flag, and has gained [new API][new-adapter-api] to track PTS, DTS and |
| 197 | offset at the last discont. This is useful for plugins implementing advanced |
| 198 | trick mode scenarios. |
| 199 | |
| 200 | [new-adapter-api]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer-libs/html/GstAdapter.html#gst-adapter-pts-at-discont |
| 201 | |
| 202 | `GstTestClock` gained a new [`"clock-type"` property][clock-type-prop]. |
| 203 | |
| 204 | [clock-type-prop]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer-libs/html/GstTestClock.html#GstTestClock--clock-type |
| 205 | |
| 206 | #### GstStream API for stream announcement and stream selection |
| 207 | |
| 208 | New stream listing and stream selection API: new API has been added to |
| 209 | provide high-level abstractions for streams ([`GstStream`][stream-api]) |
| 210 | and collections of streams ([`GstStreamCollections`][stream-collection-api]). |
| 211 | |
| 212 | ##### Stream listing |
| 213 | |
| 214 | A [`GstStream`][stream-api] contains all the information pertinent to a stream, |
| 215 | such as stream id, caps, tags, flags and stream type(s); it can represent a |
| 216 | single elementary stream (e.g. audio, video, subtitles, etc.) or a container |
| 217 | stream. This will depend on the context. In a decodebin3/playbin3 one |
| 218 | it will typically be elementary streams that can be selected and unselected. |
| 219 | |
| 220 | A [`GstStreamCollection`][stream-collection-api] represents a group of streams |
| 221 | and is used to announce or publish all available streams. A GstStreamCollection |
| 222 | is immutable - once created it won't change. If the available streams change, |
| 223 | e.g. because a new stream appeared or some streams disappeared, a new stream |
| 224 | collection will be published. This new stream collection may contain streams |
| 225 | from the previous collection if those streams persist, or completely new ones. |
| 226 | Stream collections do not yet list all theoretically available streams, |
| 227 | e.g. other available DVD angles or alternative resolutions/bitrate of the same |
| 228 | stream in case of adaptive streaming. |
| 229 | |
| 230 | New events and messages have been added to notify or update other elements and |
| 231 | the application about which streams are currently available and/or selected. |
| 232 | This way, we can easily and seamlessly let the application know whenever the |
| 233 | available streams change, as happens frequently with digital television streams |
| 234 | for example. The new system is also more flexible. For example, it is now also |
| 235 | possible for the application to select multiple streams of the same type |
| 236 | (e.g. in a transcoding/transmuxing scenario). |
| 237 | |
| 238 | A [`STREAM_COLLECTION` message][stream-collection-msg] is posted on the bus |
| 239 | to inform the parent bin (e.g. `playbin3`, `decodebin3`) and/or the application |
| 240 | about what streams are available, so you no longer have to hunt for this |
| 241 | information at different places. The available information includes number of |
| 242 | streams of each type, caps, tags etc. Bins and/or the application can intercept |
| 243 | the message synchronously to select and deselect streams before any data is |
| 244 | produced - for the case where elements such as the demuxers support the new |
| 245 | stream API, not necessarily in the parsebin compatibility fallback case. |
| 246 | |
| 247 | Similarly, there is also a [`STREAM_COLLECTION` event][stream-collection-event] |
| 248 | to inform downstream elements of the available streams. This event can be used |
| 249 | by elements to aggregate streams from multiple inputs into one single collection. |
| 250 | |
| 251 | The `STREAM_START` event was extended so that it can also contain a GstStream |
| 252 | object with all information about the current stream, see |
| 253 | [`gst_event_set_stream()`][event-set-stream] and |
| 254 | [`gst_event_parse_stream()`][event-parse-stream]. |
| 255 | [`gst_pad_get_stream()`][pad-get-stream] is a new utility function that can be |
| 256 | used to look up the GstStream from the `STREAM_START` sticky event on a pad. |
| 257 | |
| 258 | [stream-api]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/gstreamer-GstStream.html |
| 259 | [stream-collection-api]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/gstreamer-GstStreamCollection.html |
| 260 | [stream-collection-msg]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstMessage.html#gst-message-new-stream-collection |
| 261 | [stream-collection-event]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstEvent.html#gst-event-new-stream-collection |
| 262 | [event-set-stream]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstEvent.html#gst-event-set-stream |
| 263 | [event-parse-stream]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstEvent.html#gst-event-parse-stream |
| 264 | [pad-get-stream]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstPad.html#gst-pad-get-stream |
| 265 | |
| 266 | ##### Stream selection |
| 267 | |
| 268 | Once the available streams have been published, streams can be selected via |
| 269 | their stream ID using the new `SELECT_STREAMS` event, which can be created |
| 270 | with [`gst_event_new_select_streams()`][event-select-streams]. The new API |
| 271 | supports selecting multiple streams per stream type. In the future, we may also |
| 272 | implement explicit deselection of streams that will never be used, so |
| 273 | elements can skip these and never expose them or output data for them in the |
| 274 | first place. |
| 275 | |
| 276 | The application is then notified of the currently selected streams via the |
| 277 | new `STREAMS_SELECTED` message on the pipeline bus, containing both the current |
| 278 | stream collection as well as the selected streams. This might be posted in |
| 279 | response to the application sending a `SELECT_STREAMS` event or when |
| 280 | `decodebin3` or `playbin3` decide on the streams to be initially selected without |
| 281 | application input. |
| 282 | |
| 283 | [event-select-streams]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gstreamer/html/GstEvent.html#gst-event-new-select-streams |
| 284 | |
| 285 | ##### Further reading |
| 286 | |
| 287 | See further below for some notes on the new elements supporting this new |
| 288 | stream API, namely: `decodebin3`, `playbin3` and `parsebin`. |
| 289 | |
| 290 | More information about the new API and the new elements can also be found here: |
| 291 | |
| 292 | - GStreamer [stream selection design docs][streams-design] |
| 293 | - Edward Hervey's talk ["The new streams API: Design and usage"][streams-talk] ([slides][streams-slides]) |
| 294 | - Edward Hervey's talk ["Decodebin3: Dealing with modern playback use cases"][db3-talk] ([slides][db3-slides]) |
| 295 | |
| 296 | [streams-design]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gstreamer/tree/docs/design/part-stream-selection.txt |
| 297 | [streams-talk]: https://gstconf.ubicast.tv/videos/the-new-gststream-api-design-and-usage/ |
| 298 | [streams-slides]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/events/gstreamer-conference/2016/Edward%20Hervey%20-%20The%20New%20Streams%20API%20Design%20and%20Usage.pdf |
| 299 | [db3-talk]: https://gstconf.ubicast.tv/videos/decodebin3-or-dealing-with-modern-playback-use-cases/ |
| 300 | [db3-slides]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/events/gstreamer-conference/2015/Edward%20Hervey%20-%20decodebin3.pdf |
| 301 | |
| 302 | #### Audio conversion and resampling API |
| 303 | |
| 304 | The audio conversion library received a completely new and rewritten audio |
| 305 | resampler, complementing the audio conversion routines moved into the audio |
| 306 | library in the [previous release][release-notes-1.8]. Integrating the resampler |
| 307 | with the other audio conversion library allows us to implement generic |
| 308 | conversion much more efficiently, as format conversion and resampling can now |
| 309 | be done in the same processing loop instead of having to do it in separate |
| 310 | steps (our element implementations do not make use of this yet though). |
| 311 | |
| 312 | The new audio resampler library is a combination of some of the best features |
| 313 | of other samplers such as ffmpeg, speex and SRC. It natively supports S16, S32, |
| 314 | F32 and F64 formats and uses optimized x86 and neon assembly for most of its |
| 315 | processing. It also has support for dynamically changing sample rates by incrementally |
| 316 | updating the filter tables using linear or cubic interpolation. According to |
| 317 | some benchmarks, it's one of the fastest and most accurate resamplers around. |
| 318 | |
| 319 | The `audioresample` plugin has been ported to the new audio library functions |
| 320 | to make use of the new resampler. |
| 321 | |
| 322 | [release-notes-1.8]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/releases/1.8/ |
| 323 | |
| 324 | #### Support for SMPTE timecodes |
| 325 | |
| 326 | Support for SMPTE timecodes was added to the GStreamer video library. This |
| 327 | comes with an abstraction for timecodes, [`GstVideoTimeCode`][video-timecode] |
| 328 | and a [`GstMeta`][video-timecode-meta] that can be placed on video buffers for |
| 329 | carrying the timecode information for each frame. Additionally there is |
| 330 | various API for making handling of timecodes easy and to do various |
| 331 | calculations with them. |
| 332 | |
| 333 | A new plugin called [`timecode`][timecode-plugin] was added, that contains an |
| 334 | element called `timecodestamper` for putting the timecode meta on video frames |
| 335 | based on counting the frames and another element called `timecodewait` that |
| 336 | drops all video (and audio) until a specific timecode is reached. |
| 337 | |
| 338 | Additionally support was added to the Decklink plugin for including the |
| 339 | timecode information when sending video out or capturing it via SDI, the |
| 340 | `qtmux` element is able to write timecode information into the MOV container, |
| 341 | and the `timeoverlay` element can overlay timecodes on top of the video. |
| 342 | |
| 343 | More information can be found in the [talk about timecodes][timecode-talk] at |
| 344 | the GStreamer Conference 2016. |
| 345 | |
| 346 | [video-timecode]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gst-plugins-base-libs/html/gst-plugins-base-libs-gstvideo.html#GstVideoTimeCode |
| 347 | [video-timecode-meta]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gst-plugins-base-libs/html/gst-plugins-base-libs-gstvideometa.html#gst-buffer-add-video-time-code-meta |
| 348 | [timecode-plugin]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gst-plugins-bad/tree/gst/timecode |
| 349 | [timecode-talk]: https://gstconf.ubicast.tv/videos/smpte-timecodes-in-gstreamer/ |
| 350 | |
| 351 | #### GStreamer OpenMAX IL plugin |
| 352 | |
| 353 | The last gst-omx release, 1.2.0, was in July 2014. It was about time to get |
| 354 | a new one out with all the improvements that have happened in the meantime. |
| 355 | From now on, we will try to release gst-omx together with all other modules. |
| 356 | |
| 357 | This release features a lot of bugfixes, improved support for the Raspberry Pi |
| 358 | and in general improved support for zerocopy rendering via EGL and a few minor |
| 359 | new features. |
| 360 | |
| 361 | At this point, gst-omx is known to work best on the Raspberry Pi platform but |
| 362 | it is also known to work on various other platforms. Unfortunately, we are |
| 363 | not including configurations for any other platforms, so if you happen to use |
| 364 | gst-omx: please send us patches with your configuration and code changes! |
| 365 | |
| 366 | ### New Elements |
| 367 | |
| 368 | #### decodebin3, playbin3, parsebin (experimental) |
| 369 | |
| 370 | This release features new decoding and playback elements as experimental |
| 371 | technology previews: `decodebin3` and `playbin3` will soon supersede the |
| 372 | existing `decodebin` and `playbin` elements. We skipped the number 2 because |
| 373 | it was already used back in the 0.10 days, which might cause confusion. |
| 374 | Experimental technology preview means that everything should work fine already, |
| 375 | but we can't guarantee there won't be minor behavioural changes in the |
| 376 | next cycle. In any case, please test and report any problems back. |
| 377 | |
| 378 | Before we go into detail about what these new elements improve, let's look at |
| 379 | the new [`parsebin`][parsebin] element. It works similarly to `decodebin` and |
| 380 | `decodebin3`, only that it stops one step short and does not plug any actual |
| 381 | decoder elements. It will only plug parsers, tag readers, demuxers and |
| 382 | depayloaders. Also note that parsebin does not contain any queueing element. |
| 383 | |
| 384 | [`decodebin3`'s][decodebin3] internal architecture is slightly different from |
| 385 | the existing `decodebin` element and fixes many long-standing issues with our |
| 386 | decoding engine. For one, data is now fed into the internal `multiqueue` element |
| 387 | *after* it has been parsed and timestamped, which means that the `multiqueue` |
| 388 | element now has more knowledge and is able to calculate the interleaving of the |
| 389 | various streams, thus minimizing memory requirements and doing away with magic |
| 390 | values for buffering limits that were conceived when videos were 240p or 360p. |
| 391 | Anyone who has tried to play back 4k video streams with decodebin2 |
| 392 | will have noticed the limitations of that approach. The improved timestamp |
| 393 | tracking also enables `multiqueue` to keep streams of the same type (audio, |
| 394 | video) aligned better, making sure switching between streams of the same type |
| 395 | is very fast. |
| 396 | |
| 397 | Another major improvement in `decodebin3` is that it will no longer decode |
| 398 | streams that are not being used. With the old `decodebin` and `playbin`, when |
| 399 | there were 8 audio streams we would always decode all 8 streams even |
| 400 | if 7 were not actually used. This caused a lot of CPU overhead, which was |
| 401 | particularly problematic on embedded devices. When switching between streams |
| 402 | `decodebin3` will try hard to re-use existing decoders. This is useful when |
| 403 | switching between multiple streams of the same type if they are encoded in the |
| 404 | same format. |
| 405 | |
| 406 | Re-using decoders is also useful when the available streams change on the fly, |
| 407 | as might happen with radio streams (chained Oggs), digital television |
| 408 | broadcasts, when adaptive streaming streams change bitrate, or when switching |
| 409 | gaplessly to the next title. In order to guarantee a seamless transition, the |
| 410 | old `decodebin2` would plug a second decoder for the new stream while finishing |
| 411 | up the old stream. With `decodebin3`, this is no longer needed - at least not |
| 412 | when the new and old format are the same. This will be particularly useful |
| 413 | on embedded systems where it is often not possible to run multiple decoders |
| 414 | at the same time, or when tearing down and setting up decoders is fairly |
| 415 | expensive. |
| 416 | |
| 417 | `decodebin3` also allows for multiple input streams, not just a single one. |
| 418 | This will be useful, in the future, for gapless playback, or for feeding |
| 419 | multiple external subtitle streams to decodebin/playbin. |
| 420 | |
| 421 | `playbin3` uses `decodebin3` internally, and will supercede `playbin`. |
| 422 | It was decided that it would be too risky to make the old `playbin` use the |
| 423 | new `decodebin3` in a backwards-compatible way. The new architecture |
| 424 | makes it awkward, if not impossible, to maintain perfect backwards compatibility |
| 425 | in some aspects, hence `playbin3` was born, and developers can migrate to the |
| 426 | new element and new API at their own pace. |
| 427 | |
| 428 | All of these new elements make use of the new `GstStream` API for listing and |
| 429 | selecting streams, as described above. `parsebin` provides backwards |
| 430 | compatibility for demuxers and parsers which do not advertise their streams |
| 431 | using the new API yet (which is most). |
| 432 | |
| 433 | The new elements are not entirely feature-complete yet: `playbin3` does not |
| 434 | support so-called decodersinks yet where the data is not decoded inside |
| 435 | GStreamer but passed directly for decoding to the sink. `decodebin3` is missing |
| 436 | the various `autoplug-*` signals to influence which decoders get autoplugged |
| 437 | in which order. We're looking to add back this functionality, but it will probably |
| 438 | be in a different way, with a single unified signal and using GstStream perhaps. |
| 439 | |
| 440 | For more information on these new elements, check out Edward Hervey's talk |
| 441 | [*decodebin3 - dealing with modern playback use cases*][db3-talk] |
| 442 | |
| 443 | [parsebin]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gst-plugins-base-plugins/html/gst-plugins-base-plugins-parsebin.html |
| 444 | [decodebin3]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gst-plugins-base-plugins/html/gst-plugins-base-plugins-decodebin3.html |
| 445 | [db3-talk]: https://gstconf.ubicast.tv/videos/decodebin3-or-dealing-with-modern-playback-use-cases/ |
| 446 | |
| 447 | #### LV2 ported from 0.10 and switched from slv2 to lilv2 |
| 448 | |
| 449 | The LV2 wrapper plugin has been ported to 1.0 and moved from using the |
| 450 | deprecated slv2 library to its replacement liblv2. We support sources and |
| 451 | filter elements. lv2 is short for *Linux Audio Developer's Simple Plugin API |
| 452 | (LADSPA) version 2* and is an open standard for audio plugins which includes |
| 453 | support for audio synthesis (generation), digital signal processing of digital |
| 454 | audio, and MIDI. The new lv2 plugin supersedes the existing LADSPA plugin. |
| 455 | |
| 456 | #### WebRTC DSP Plugin for echo-cancellation, gain control and noise suppression |
| 457 | |
| 458 | A set of new elements ([webrtcdsp][webrtcdsp], [webrtcechoprobe][webrtcechoprobe]) |
| 459 | based on the WebRTC DSP software stack can now be used to improve your audio |
| 460 | voice communication pipelines. They support echo cancellation, gain control, |
| 461 | noise suppression and more. For more details you may read |
| 462 | [Nicolas' blog post][webrtc-blog-post]. |
| 463 | |
| 464 | [webrtcdsp]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gst-plugins-bad-plugins/html/gst-plugins-bad-plugins-webrtcdsp.html |
| 465 | [webrtcechoprobe]: https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/doc/gstreamer/head/gst-plugins-bad-plugins/html/gst-plugins-bad-plugins-webrtcechoprobe.html |
| 466 | [webrtc-blog-post]: https://ndufresne.ca/2016/06/gstreamer-echo-canceller/ |
| 467 | |
| 468 | #### Fraunhofer FDK AAC encoder and decoder |
| 469 | |
| 470 | New encoder and decoder elements wrapping the Fraunhofer FDK AAC library have |
| 471 | been added (`fdkaacdec`, `fdkaacdec`). The Fraunhofer FDK AAC encoder is |
| 472 | generally considered to be a very high-quality AAC encoder, but unfortunately |
| 473 | it comes under a non-free license with the option to obtain a paid, commercial |
| 474 | license. |
| 475 | |
| 476 | ### Noteworthy element features and additions |
| 477 | |
| 478 | #### Major RTP and RTSP improvements |
| 479 | |
| 480 | - The RTSP server and source element, as well as the RTP jitterbuffer now support |
| 481 | remote clock synchronization according to [RFC7273][https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc7273]. |
| 482 | - Support for application and profile specific RTCP packets was added. |
| 483 | - The H265/HEVC payloader/depayloader is again in sync with the final RFC. |
| 484 | - Seeking stability of the RTSP source and server was improved a lot and |
| 485 | runs stably now, even when doing scrub-seeking. |
| 486 | - The RTSP server received various major bugfixes, including for regressions that |
| 487 | caused the IP/port address pool to not be considered, or NAT hole punching |
| 488 | to not work anymore. [Bugzilla #766612][https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=766612] |
| 489 | - Various other bugfixes that improve the stability of RTP and RTSP, including |
| 490 | many new unit / integration tests. |
| 491 | |
| 492 | #### Improvements to splitmuxsrc and splitmuxsink |
| 493 | |
| 494 | - The splitmux element received reliability and error handling improvements, |
| 495 | removing at least one deadlock case. `splitmuxsrc` now stops cleanly at the end |
| 496 | of the segment when handling seeks with a stop time. We fixed a bug with large |
| 497 | amounts of downstream buffering causing incorrect out-of-sequence playback. |
| 498 | |
| 499 | - `splitmuxsrc` now has a `"format-location"` signal to directly specify the list |
| 500 | of files to play from. |
| 501 | |
| 502 | - `splitmuxsink` can now optionally send force-keyunit events to upstream |
| 503 | elements to allow splitting files more accurately instead of having to wait |
| 504 | for upstream to provide a new keyframe by itself. |
| 505 | |
| 506 | #### OpenGL/GLES improvements |
| 507 | |
| 508 | ##### iOS and macOS (OS/X) |
| 509 | |
| 510 | - We now create OpenGL|ES 3.x contexts on iOS by default with a fallback to |
| 511 | OpenGL|ES 2.x if that fails. |
| 512 | - Various zerocopy decoding fixes and enhancements with the |
| 513 | encoding/decoding/capturing elements. |
| 514 | - libdispatch is now used on all Apple platforms instead of GMainLoop, removing |
| 515 | the expensive poll()/pthread_*() overhead. |
| 516 | |
| 517 | ##### New API |
| 518 | |
| 519 | - `GstGLFramebuffer` - for wrapping OpenGL frame buffer objects. It provides |
| 520 | facilities for attaching `GstGLMemory` objects to the necessary attachment |
| 521 | points, binding and unbinding and running a user-supplied function with the |
| 522 | framebuffer bound. |
| 523 | - `GstGLRenderbuffer` (a `GstGLBaseMemory` subclass) - for wrapping OpenGL |
| 524 | render buffer objects that are typically used for depth/stencil buffers or |
| 525 | for color buffers where we don't care about the output. |
| 526 | - `GstGLMemoryEGL` (a `GstGLMemory` subclass) - for combining `EGLImage`s with a GL |
| 527 | texture that replaces `GstEGLImageMemory` bringing the improvements made to the |
| 528 | other `GstGLMemory` implementations. This fixes a performance regression in |
| 529 | zerocopy decoding on the Raspberry Pi when used with an updated gst-omx. |
| 530 | |
| 531 | ##### Miscellaneous improvements |
| 532 | |
| 533 | - `gltestsrc` is now usable on devices/platforms with OpenGL 3.x and OpenGL|ES |
| 534 | and has completed or gained support for new patterns in line with the |
| 535 | existing ones in `videotestsrc`. |
| 536 | - `gldeinterlace` is now available on devices/platforms with OpenGL|ES |
| 537 | implementations. |
| 538 | - The dispmanx backend (used on the Raspberry Pi) now supports the |
| 539 | `gst_video_overlay_set_window_handle()` and |
| 540 | `gst_video_overlay_set_render_rectangle()` functions. |
| 541 | - The `gltransformation` element now correctly transforms mouse coordinates (in |
| 542 | window space) to stream coordinates for both perspective and orthographic |
| 543 | projections. |
| 544 | - The `gltransformation` element now detects if the |
| 545 | `GstVideoAffineTransformationMeta` is supported downstream and will efficiently |
| 546 | pass its transformation downstream. This is a performance improvement as it |
| 547 | results in less processing being required. |
| 548 | - The wayland implementation now uses the multi-threaded safe event-loop API |
| 549 | allowing correct usage in applications that call wayland functions from |
| 550 | multiple threads. |
| 551 | - Support for native 90 degree rotations and horizontal/vertical flips |
| 552 | in `glimagesink`. |
| 553 | |
| 554 | #### Vulkan |
| 555 | |
| 556 | - The Vulkan elements now work under Wayland and have received numerous |
| 557 | bugfixes. |
| 558 | |
| 559 | #### QML elements |
| 560 | |
| 561 | - `qmlglsink` video sink now works on more platforms, notably, Windows, Wayland, |
| 562 | and Qt's eglfs (for embedded devices with an OpenGL implementation) including |
| 563 | the Raspberry Pi. |
| 564 | - New element `qmlglsrc` to record a QML scene into a GStreamer pipeline. |
| 565 | |
| 566 | #### KMS video sink |
| 567 | |
| 568 | - New element `kmssink` to render video using Direct Rendering Manager |
| 569 | (DRM) and Kernel Mode Setting (KMS) subsystems in the Linux |
| 570 | kernel. It is oriented to be used mostly in embedded systems. |
| 571 | |
| 572 | #### Wayland video sink |
| 573 | |
| 574 | - `waylandsink` now supports the wl_viewporter extension allowing |
| 575 | video scaling and cropping to be delegated to the Wayland |
| 576 | compositor. This extension is also been made optional, so that it can |
| 577 | also work on current compositors that don't support it. It also now has |
| 578 | support for the video meta, allowing zero-copy operations in more |
| 579 | cases. |
| 580 | |
| 581 | #### DVB improvements |
| 582 | |
| 583 | - `dvbsrc` now has better delivery-system autodetection and several |
| 584 | new parameter sanity-checks to improve its resilience to configuration |
| 585 | omissions and errors. Superfluous polling continues to be trimmed down, |
| 586 | and the debugging output has been made more consistent and precise. |
| 587 | Additionally, the channel-configuration parser now supports the new dvbv5 |
| 588 | format, enabling `dvbbasebin` to automatically playback content transmitted |
| 589 | on delivery systems that previously required manual description, like ISDB-T. |
| 590 | |
| 591 | #### DASH, HLS and adaptivedemux |
| 592 | |
| 593 | - HLS now has support for Alternate Rendition audio and video tracks. Full |
| 594 | support for Alternate Rendition subtitle tracks will be in an upcoming release. |
| 595 | - DASH received support for keyframe-only trick modes if the |
| 596 | `GST_SEEK_FLAG_TRICKMODE_KEY_UNITS` flag is given when seeking. It will |
| 597 | only download keyframes then, which should help with high-speed playback. |
| 598 | Changes to skip over multiple frames based on bandwidth and other metrics |
| 599 | will be added in the near future. |
| 600 | - Lots of reliability fixes around seek handling and bitrate switching. |
| 601 | |
| 602 | #### Bluetooth improvements |
| 603 | |
| 604 | - The `avdtpsrc` element now supports metadata such as track title, artist |
| 605 | name, and more, which devices can send via AVRCP. These are published as |
| 606 | tags on the pipeline. |
| 607 | - The `a2dpsink` element received some love and was cleaned up so that it |
| 608 | actually works after the initial GStreamer 1.0 port. |
| 609 | |
| 610 | #### GStreamer VAAPI |
| 611 | |
| 612 | - All the decoders have been split, one plugin feature per codec. So |
| 613 | far, the available ones, depending on the driver, are: |
| 614 | `vaapimpeg2dec`, `vaapih264dec`, `vaapih265dec`, `vaapivc1dec`, `vaapivp8dec`, |
| 615 | `vaapivp9dec` and `vaapijpegdec` (which already was split). |
| 616 | - Improvements when mapping VA surfaces into memory. It now differentiates |
| 617 | between negotiation caps and allocations caps, since the allocation |
| 618 | memory for surfaces may be bigger than one that is going to be |
| 619 | mapped. |
| 620 | - `vaapih265enc` now supports constant bitrate mode (CBR). |
| 621 | - Since several VA drivers are unmaintained, we decide to keep a whitelist |
| 622 | with the va drivers we actually test, which is mostly the i915 and to a lesser |
| 623 | degree gallium from the mesa project. Exporting the environment variable |
| 624 | `GST_VAAPI_ALL_DRIVERS` disables the whitelist. |
| 625 | - Plugin features are registered at run-time, according to their support by |
| 626 | the loaded VA driver. So only the decoders and encoder supported by the |
| 627 | system are registered. Since the driver can change, some dependencies are |
| 628 | tracked to invalidate the GStreamer registry and reload the plugin. |
| 629 | - `dmabuf` importation from upstream has been improved, gaining performance. |
| 630 | - `vaapipostproc` now can negotiate buffer transformations via caps. |
| 631 | - Decoders now can do I-frame only reverse playback. This decodes I-frames |
| 632 | only because the surface pool is smaller than the required by the GOP to show all the |
| 633 | frames. |
| 634 | - The upload of frames onto native GL textures has been optimized too, keeping |
| 635 | a cache of the internal structures for the offered textures by the sink. |
| 636 | |
| 637 | #### V4L2 changes |
| 638 | |
| 639 | - More pixels formats are now supported |
| 640 | - Decoder is now using `G_SELECTION` instead of the deprecated `G_CROP` |
| 641 | - Decoder now uses the `STOP` command to handle EOS |
| 642 | - Transform element can now scale the pixel aspect ratio |
| 643 | - Colorimetry support has been improved even more |
| 644 | - We now support the `OUTPUT_OVERLAY` type of video node in v4l2sink |
| 645 | |
| 646 | #### Miscellaneous |
| 647 | |
| 648 | - `multiqueue`'s input pads gained a new `"group-id"` property which |
| 649 | can be used to group input streams. Typically one will assign |
| 650 | different id numbers to audio, video and subtitle streams for |
| 651 | example. This way `multiqueue` can make sure streams of the same |
| 652 | type advance in lockstep if some of the streams are unlinked and the |
| 653 | `"sync-by-running-time"` property is set. This is used in |
| 654 | decodebin3/playbin3 to implement almost-instantaneous stream |
| 655 | switching. The grouping is required because different downstream |
| 656 | paths (audio, video, etc.) may have different buffering/latency |
| 657 | etc. so might be consuming data from multiqueue with a slightly |
| 658 | different phase, and if we track different stream groups separately |
| 659 | we minimize stream switching delays and buffering inside the |
| 660 | `multiqueue`. |
| 661 | - `alsasrc` now supports ALSA drivers without a position for each |
| 662 | channel, this is common in some professional or industrial hardware. |
| 663 | - `libvpx` based decoders (`vp8dec` and `vp9dec`) now create multiple threads on |
| 664 | computers with multiple CPUs automatically. |
| 665 | - `rfbsrc` - used for capturing from a VNC server - has seen a lot of |
| 666 | debugging. It now supports the latest version of the RFB |
| 667 | protocol and uses GIO everywhere. |
| 668 | - `tsdemux` can now read ATSC E-AC-3 streams. |
| 669 | - New `GstVideoDirection` video orientation interface for rotating, flipping |
| 670 | and mirroring video in 90° steps. It is implemented by the `videoflip` and |
| 671 | `glvideoflip` elements currently. |
| 672 | - It is now possible to give `appsrc` a duration in time, and there is now a |
| 673 | non-blocking try-pull API for `appsink` that returns NULL if nothing is |
| 674 | available right now. |
| 675 | - `x264enc` has support now for chroma-site and colorimetry settings |
| 676 | - A new JPEG2000 parser element was added, and the JPEG2000 caps were cleaned |
| 677 | up and gained more information needed in combination with RTP and various |
| 678 | container formats. |
| 679 | - Reverse playback support for `videorate` and `deinterlace` was implemented |
| 680 | - Various improvements everywhere for reverse playback and `KEY_UNITS` trick mode |
| 681 | - New cleaned up `rawaudioparse` and `rawvideoparse` elements that replace the |
| 682 | old `audioparse` and `videoparse` elements. There are compatibility element |
| 683 | factories registered with the old names to allow existing code to continue |
| 684 | to work. |
| 685 | - The Decklink plugin gained support for 10 bit video SMPTE timecodes, and |
| 686 | generally got many bugfixes for various issues. |
| 687 | - New API in `GstPlayer` for setting the multiview mode for stereoscopic |
| 688 | video, setting an HTTP/RTSP user agent and a time offset between audio and |
| 689 | video. In addition to that, there were various bugfixes and the new |
| 690 | gst-examples module contains Android, iOS, GTK+ and Qt example applications. |
| 691 | - `GstBin` has new API for suppressing various `GstElement` or `GstObject` |
| 692 | flags that would otherwise be affected by added/removed child elements. This |
| 693 | new API allows `GstBin` subclasses to handle for themselves if they |
| 694 | should be considered a sink or source element, for example. |
| 695 | - The `subparse` element can handle WebVTT streams now. |
| 696 | - A new `sdpsrc` element was added that can read an SDP from a file, or get it |
| 697 | as a string as property and then sets up an RTP pipeline accordingly. |
| 698 | |
| 699 | ### Plugin moves |
| 700 | |
| 701 | No plugins were moved this cycle. We'll make up for it next cycle, promise! |
| 702 | |
| 703 | ### Rewritten memory leak tracer |
| 704 | |
| 705 | GStreamer has had basic functionality to trace allocation and freeing of |
| 706 | both mini-objects (buffers, events, caps, etc.) and objects in the form of the |
| 707 | internal `GstAllocTrace` tracing system. This API was never exposed in the |
| 708 | 1.x API series though. When requested, this would dump a list of objects and |
| 709 | mini-objects at exit time which had still not been freed at that point, |
| 710 | enabled with an environment variable. This subsystem has now been removed |
| 711 | in favour of a new implementation based on the recently-added tracing framework. |
| 712 | |
| 713 | Tracing hooks have been added to trace the creation and destruction of |
| 714 | GstObjects and mini-objects, and a new tracer plugin has been written using |
| 715 | those new hooks to track which objects are still live and which are not. If |
| 716 | GStreamer has been compiled against the libunwind library, the new leaks tracer |
| 717 | will remember where objects were allocated from as well. By default the leaks |
| 718 | tracer will simply output a warning if leaks have been detected on `gst_deinit()`. |
| 719 | |
| 720 | If the `GST_LEAKS_TRACER_SIG` environment variable is set, the leaks tracer |
| 721 | will also handle the following UNIX signals: |
| 722 | |
| 723 | - `SIGUSR1`: log alive objects |
| 724 | - `SIGUSR2`: create a checkpoint and print a list of objects created and |
| 725 | destroyed since the previous checkpoint. |
| 726 | |
| 727 | Unfortunately this will not work on Windows due to no signals, however. |
| 728 | |
| 729 | If the `GST_LEAKS_TRACER_STACK_TRACE` environment variable is set, the leaks |
| 730 | tracer will also log the creation stack trace of leaked objects. This may |
| 731 | significantly increase memory consumption however. |
| 732 | |
| 733 | New `MAY_BE_LEAKED` flags have been added to GstObject and GstMiniObject, so |
| 734 | that objects and mini-objects that are likely to stay around forever can be |
| 735 | flagged and blacklisted from the leak output. |
| 736 | |
| 737 | To give the new leak tracer a spin, simply call any GStreamer application such |
| 738 | as `gst-launch-1.0` or `gst-play-1.0` like this: |
| 739 | |
| 740 | GST_TRACERS=leaks gst-launch-1.0 videotestsrc num-buffers=10 ! fakesink |
| 741 | |
| 742 | If there are any leaks, a warning will be raised at the end. |
| 743 | |
| 744 | It is also possible to trace only certain types of objects or mini-objects: |
| 745 | |
| 746 | GST_TRACERS="leaks(GstEvent,GstMessage)" gst-launch-1.0 videotestsrc num-buffers=10 ! fakesink |
| 747 | |
| 748 | This dedicated leaks tracer is much much faster than valgrind since all code is |
| 749 | executed natively instead of being instrumented. This makes it very suitable |
| 750 | for use on slow machines or embedded devices. It is however limited to certain |
| 751 | types of leaks and won't catch memory leaks when the allocation has been made |
| 752 | via plain old `malloc()` or `g_malloc()` or other means. It will also not trace |
| 753 | non-GstObject GObjects. |
| 754 | |
| 755 | The goal is to enable leak tracing on GStreamer's Continuous-Integration and |
| 756 | testing system, both for the regular unit tests (make check) and media tests |
| 757 | (gst-validate), so that accidental leaks in common code paths can be detected |
| 758 | and fixed quickly. |
| 759 | |
| 760 | For more information about the new tracer, check out Guillaume Desmottes's |
| 761 | ["Tracking Memory Leaks"][leaks-talk] talk or his [blog post][leaks-blog] about |
| 762 | the topic. |
| 763 | |
| 764 | [leaks-talk]: https://gstconf.ubicast.tv/videos/tracking-memory-leaks/ |
| 765 | [leaks-blog]: https://blog.desmottes.be/?post/2016/06/20/GStreamer-leaks-tracer |
| 766 | |
| 767 | ### GES and NLE changes |
| 768 | |
| 769 | - Clip priorities are now handled by the layers, and the GESTimelineElement |
| 770 | priority property is now deprecated and unused |
| 771 | - Enhanced (de)interlacing support to always use the `deinterlace` element |
| 772 | and expose needed properties to users |
| 773 | - Allow reusing clips children after removing the clip from a layer |
| 774 | - We are now testing many more rendering formats in the gst-validate |
| 775 | test suite, and failures have been fixed. |
| 776 | - Also many bugs have been fixed in this cycle! |
| 777 | |
| 778 | ### GStreamer validate changes |
| 779 | |
| 780 | This cycle has been focused on making GstValidate more than just a validating |
| 781 | tool, but also a tool to help developers debug their GStreamer issues. When |
| 782 | reporting issues, we try to gather as much information as possible and expose |
| 783 | it to end users in a useful way. For an example of such enhancements, check out |
| 784 | Thibault Saunier's [blog post](improving-debugging-gstreamer-validate) about |
| 785 | the new Not Negotiated Error reporting mechanism. |
| 786 | |
| 787 | Playbin3 support has been added so we can run validate tests with `playbin3` |
| 788 | instead of playbin. |
| 789 | |
| 790 | We are now able to properly communicate between `gst-validate-launcher` and |
| 791 | launched subprocesses with actual IPC between them. That has enabled the test |
| 792 | launcher to handle failing tests specifying the exact expected issue(s). |
| 793 | |
| 794 | [improving-debugging-gstreamer-validate]: https://blogs.s-osg.org/improving-debugging-gstreamer-validate/ |
| 795 | |
| 796 | ### gst-libav changes |
| 797 | |
| 798 | gst-libav uses the recently released ffmpeg 3.2 now, which brings a lot of |
| 799 | improvements and bugfixes from the ffmpeg team in addition to various new |
| 800 | codec mappings on the GStreamer side and quite a few bugfixes to the GStreamer |
| 801 | integration to make it more robust. |
| 802 | |
| 803 | ## Build and Dependencies |
| 804 | |
| 805 | ### Experimental support for Meson as build system |
| 806 | |
| 807 | #### Overview |
| 808 | |
| 809 | We have have added support for building GStreamer using the |
| 810 | [Meson build system][meson]. This is currently experimental, but should work |
| 811 | fine at least on Linux using the gcc or clang toolchains and on Windows using |
| 812 | the MingW or MSVC toolchains. |
| 813 | |
| 814 | Autotools remains the primary build system for the time being, but we hope to |
| 815 | someday replace it and will steadily work towards that goal. |
| 816 | |
| 817 | More information about the background and implications of all this and where |
| 818 | we're hoping to go in future with this can be found in [Tim's mail][meson-mail] |
| 819 | to the gstreamer-devel mailing list. |
| 820 | |
| 821 | For more information on Meson check out [these videos][meson-videos] and also |
| 822 | the [Meson talk][meson-gstconf] at the GStreamer Conference. |
| 823 | |
| 824 | Immediate benefits for Linux users are faster builds and rebuilds. At the time |
| 825 | of writing the Meson build of GStreamer is used by default in GNOME's jhbuild |
| 826 | system. |
| 827 | |
| 828 | The Meson build currently still lacks many of the fine-grained configuration |
| 829 | options to enable/disable specific plugins. These will be added back in due |
| 830 | course. |
| 831 | |
| 832 | Note: The meson build files are not distributed in the source tarballs, you will |
| 833 | need to get GStreamer from git if you want try it out. |
| 834 | |
| 835 | [meson]: http://mesonbuild.com/ |
| 836 | [meson-mail]: https://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/gstreamer-devel/2016-September/060231.html |
| 837 | [meson-videos]: http://mesonbuild.com/videos.html |
| 838 | [meson-gstconf]: https://gstconf.ubicast.tv/videos/gstreamer-development-on-windows-ans-faster-builds-everywhere-with-meson/ |
| 839 | |
| 840 | #### Windows Visual Studio toolchain support |
| 841 | |
| 842 | Windows users might appreciate being able to build GStreamer using the MSVC |
| 843 | toolchain, which is not possible using autotools. This means that it will be |
| 844 | possible to debug GStreamer and applications in Visual Studio, for example. |
| 845 | We require VS2015 or newer for this at the moment. |
| 846 | |
| 847 | There are two ways to build GStreamer using the MSVC toolchain: |
| 848 | |
| 849 | 1. Using the MSVC command-line tools (`cl.exe` etc.) via Meson's "ninja" backend. |
| 850 | 2. Letting Meson's "vs2015" backend generate Visual Studio project files that |
| 851 | can be opened in Visual Studio and compiled from there. |
| 852 | |
| 853 | This is currently only for adventurous souls though. All the bits are in place, |
| 854 | but support for all of this has not been merged into GStreamer's cerbero build |
| 855 | tool yet at the time of writing. This will hopefully happen in the next cycle, |
| 856 | but for now this means that those wishing to compile GStreamer with MSVC will |
| 857 | have to get their hands dirty. |
| 858 | |
| 859 | There are also no binary SDK builds using the MSVC toolchain yet. |
| 860 | |
| 861 | For more information on GStreamer builds using Meson and the Windows toolchain |
| 862 | check out Nirbheek Chauhan's blog post ["Building and developing GStreamer using Visual Studio"][msvc-blog]. |
| 863 | |
| 864 | [msvc-blog]: http://blog.nirbheek.in/2016/07/building-and-developing-gstreamer-using.html |
| 865 | |
| 866 | ### Dependencies |
| 867 | |
| 868 | #### gstreamer |
| 869 | |
| 870 | libunwind was added as an optional dependency. It is used only for debugging |
| 871 | and tracing purposes. |
| 872 | |
| 873 | The `opencv` plugin in gst-plugins-bad can now be built against OpenCV |
| 874 | version 3.1, previously only 2.3-2.5 were supported. |
| 875 | |
| 876 | #### gst-plugins-ugly |
| 877 | |
| 878 | - `mpeg2dec` now requires at least libmpeg2 0.5.1 (from 2008). |
| 879 | |
| 880 | #### gst-plugins-bad |
| 881 | |
| 882 | - `gltransformation` now requires at least graphene 1.4.0. |
| 883 | |
| 884 | - `lv2` now plugin requires at least lilv 0.16 instead of slv2. |
| 885 | |
| 886 | ### Packaging notes |
| 887 | |
| 888 | Packagers please note that the `gst/gstconfig.h` public header file in the |
| 889 | GStreamer core library moved back from being an architecture dependent include |
| 890 | to being architecture independent, and thus it is no longer installed into |
| 891 | `$(libdir)/gstreamer-1.0/include/gst` but into the normal include directory |
| 892 | where it lives happily ever after with all the other public header files. The |
| 893 | reason for this is that we now check whether the target supports unaligned |
| 894 | memory access based on predefined compiler macros at compile time instead of |
| 895 | checking it at configure time. |
| 896 | |
| 897 | ## Platform-specific improvements |
| 898 | |
| 899 | ### Android |
| 900 | |
| 901 | #### New universal binaries for all supported ABIs |
| 902 | |
| 903 | We now provide a "universal" tarball to allow building apps against all the |
| 904 | architectures currently supported (x86, x86-64, armeabi, armeabi-v7a, |
| 905 | armeabi-v8a). This is needed for building with recent versions of the Android |
| 906 | NDK which defaults to building against all supported ABIs. Use [the Android |
| 907 | player example][android-player-example-build] as a reference for the required |
| 908 | changes. |
| 909 | |
| 910 | [android-player-example-build]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gst-examples/commit/playback/player/android?id=a5cdde9119f038a1eb365aca20faa9741a38e788 |
| 911 | |
| 912 | #### Miscellaneous |
| 913 | |
| 914 | - New `ahssrc` element that allows reading the hardware sensors, e.g. compass |
| 915 | or accelerometer. |
| 916 | |
| 917 | ### macOS (OS/X) and iOS |
| 918 | |
| 919 | - Support for querying available devices on OS/X via the GstDeviceProvider |
| 920 | API was added. |
| 921 | - It is now possible to create OpenGL|ES 3.x contexts on iOS and use them in |
| 922 | combination with the VideoToolbox based decoder element. |
| 923 | - many OpenGL/GLES improvements, see OpenGL section above |
| 924 | |
| 925 | ### Windows |
| 926 | |
| 927 | - gstconfig.h: Always use dllexport/import on Windows with MSVC |
| 928 | - Miscellaneous fixes to make libs and plugins compile with the MVSC toolchain |
| 929 | - MSVC toolchain support (see Meson section above for more details) |
| 930 | |
| 931 | ## New Modules for Documentation, Examples, Meson Build |
| 932 | |
| 933 | Three new git modules have been added recently: |
| 934 | |
| 935 | ### gst-docs |
| 936 | |
| 937 | This is a new module where we will maintain documentation in the markdown |
| 938 | format. |
| 939 | |
| 940 | It contains the former gstreamer.com SDK tutorials which have kindly been made |
| 941 | available by Fluendo under a Creative Commons license. The tutorials have been |
| 942 | reviewed and updated for GStreamer 1.x and will be available as part of the |
| 943 | [official GStreamer documentation][doc] going forward. The old gstreamer.com |
| 944 | site will then be shut down with redirects pointing to the updated tutorials. |
| 945 | |
| 946 | Some of the existing docbook XML-formatted documentation from the GStreamer |
| 947 | core module such as the *Application Development Manual* and the *Plugin |
| 948 | Writer's Guide* have been converted to markdown as well and will be maintained |
| 949 | in the gst-docs module in future. They will be removed from the GStreamer core |
| 950 | module in the next cycle. |
| 951 | |
| 952 | This is just the beginning. Our goal is to provide a more cohesive documentation |
| 953 | experience for our users going forward, and easier to create and maintain |
| 954 | documentation for developers. There is a lot more work to do, get in touch if |
| 955 | you want to help out. |
| 956 | |
| 957 | If you encounter any problems or spot any omissions or outdated content in the |
| 958 | new documentation, please [file a bug in bugzilla][doc-bug] to let us know. |
| 959 | |
| 960 | We will probably release gst-docs as a separate tarball for distributions to |
| 961 | package in the next cycle. |
| 962 | |
| 963 | [doc]: http://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/documentation/ |
| 964 | [doc-bug]: https://bugzilla.gnome.org/enter_bug.cgi?product=GStreamer&component=documentation |
| 965 | |
| 966 | ### gst-examples |
| 967 | |
| 968 | A new [module][examples-git] has been added for examples. It does not contain |
| 969 | much yet, currently it only contains a small [http-launch][http-launch] utility |
| 970 | that serves a pipeline over http as well as various [GstPlayer playback frontends][puis] |
| 971 | for Android, iOS, Gtk+ and Qt. |
| 972 | |
| 973 | More examples will be added over time. The examples in this repository should |
| 974 | be more useful and more substantial than most of the examples we ship as part |
| 975 | of our other modules, and also written in a way that makes them good example |
| 976 | code. If you have ideas for examples, let us know. |
| 977 | |
| 978 | No decision has been made yet if this module will be released and/or packaged. |
| 979 | It probably makes sense to do so though. |
| 980 | |
| 981 | [examples-git]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gst-examples/tree/ |
| 982 | [http-launch]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gst-examples/tree/network/http-launch/ |
| 983 | [puis]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gst-examples/tree/playback/player |
| 984 | |
| 985 | ### gst-build |
| 986 | |
| 987 | [gst-build][gst-build-git] is a new meta module to build GStreamer using the |
| 988 | new Meson build system. This module is not required to build GStreamer with |
| 989 | Meson, it is merely for convenience and aims to provide a development setup |
| 990 | similar to the existing `gst-uninstalled` setup. |
| 991 | |
| 992 | gst-build makes use of Meson's [subproject feature][meson-subprojects] and sets |
| 993 | up the various GStreamer modules as subprojects, so they can all be updated and |
| 994 | built in parallel. |
| 995 | |
| 996 | This module is still very new and highly experimental. It should work at least |
| 997 | on Linux and Windows (OS/X needs some build fixes). Let us know of any issues |
| 998 | you encounter by popping into the `#gstreamer` IRC channel or by |
| 999 | [filing a bug][gst-build-bug]. |
| 1000 | |
| 1001 | This module will probably not be released or packaged (does not really make sense). |
| 1002 | |
| 1003 | [gst-build-git]: https://cgit.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gst-build/tree/ |
| 1004 | [gst-build-bug]: https://bugzilla.gnome.org/enter_bug.cgi?product=GStreamer&component=gst-build |
| 1005 | [meson-subprojects]: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/wiki/Subprojects |
| 1006 | |
| 1007 | ## Contributors |
| 1008 | |
| 1009 | Aaron Boxer, Aleix Conchillo Flaqué, Alessandro Decina, Alexandru Băluț, Alex |
| 1010 | Ashley, Alex-P. Natsios, Alistair Buxton, Allen Zhang, Andreas Naumann, Andrew |
| 1011 | Eikum, Andy Devar, Anthony G. Basile, Arjen Veenhuizen, Arnaud Vrac, Artem |
| 1012 | Martynovich, Arun Raghavan, Aurélien Zanelli, Barun Kumar Singh, Bernhard |
| 1013 | Miller, Brad Lackey, Branko Subasic, Carlos Garcia Campos, Carlos Rafael |
| 1014 | Giani, Christoffer Stengren, Daiki Ueno, Damian Ziobro, Danilo Cesar Lemes de |
| 1015 | Paula, David Buchmann, Dimitrios Katsaros, Duncan Palmer, Edward Hervey, |
| 1016 | Emmanuel Poitier, Enrico Jorns, Enrique Ocaña González, Fabrice Bellet, |
| 1017 | Florian Zwoch, Florin Apostol, Francisco Velazquez, Frédéric Bertolus, Fredrik |
| 1018 | Fornwall, Gaurav Gupta, George Kiagiadakis, Georg Lippitsch, Göran Jönsson, |
| 1019 | Graham Leggett, Gregoire Gentil, Guillaume Desmottes, Gwang Yoon Hwang, Haakon |
| 1020 | Sporsheim, Haihua Hu, Havard Graff, Heinrich Fink, Hoonhee Lee, Hyunjun Ko, |
| 1021 | Iain Lane, Ian, Ian Jamison, Jagyum Koo, Jake Foytik, Jakub Adam, Jan |
| 1022 | Alexander Steffens (heftig), Jan Schmidt, Javier Martinez Canillas, Jerome |
| 1023 | Laheurte, Jesper Larsen, Jie Jiang, Jihae Yi, Jimmy Ohn, Jinwoo Ahn, Joakim |
| 1024 | Johansson, Joan Pau Beltran, Jonas Holmberg, Jonathan Matthew, Jonathan Roy, |
| 1025 | Josep Torra, Julien Isorce, Jun Ji, Jürgen Slowack, Justin Kim, Kazunori |
| 1026 | Kobayashi, Kieran Bingham, Kipp Cannon, Koop Mast, Kouhei Sutou, Kseniia, Kyle |
| 1027 | Schwarz, Kyungyong Kim, Linus Svensson, Luis de Bethencourt, Marcin Kolny, |
| 1028 | Marcin Lewandowski, Marianna Smidth Buschle, Mario Sanchez Prada, Mark |
| 1029 | Combellack, Mark Nauwelaerts, Martin Kelly, Matej Knopp, Mathieu Duponchelle, |
| 1030 | Mats Lindestam, Matthew Gruenke, Matthew Waters, Michael Olbrich, Michal Lazo, |
| 1031 | Miguel París Díaz, Mikhail Fludkov, Minjae Kim, Mohan R, Munez, Nicola Murino, |
| 1032 | Nicolas Dufresne, Nicolas Huet, Nikita Bobkov, Nirbheek Chauhan, Olivier |
| 1033 | Crête, Paolo Pettinato, Patricia Muscalu, Paulo Neves, Peng Liu, Peter |
| 1034 | Seiderer, Philippe Normand, Philippe Renon, Philipp Zabel, Pierre Lamot, Piotr |
| 1035 | Drąg, Prashant Gotarne, Raffaele Rossi, Ray Strode, Reynaldo H. Verdejo |
| 1036 | Pinochet, Santiago Carot-Nemesio, Scott D Phillips, Sebastian Dröge, Sebastian |
| 1037 | Rasmussen, Sergei Saveliev, Sergey Borovkov, Sergey Mamonov, Sergio Torres |
| 1038 | Soldado, Seungha Yang, sezero, Song Bing, Sreerenj Balachandran, Stefan Sauer, |
| 1039 | Stephen, Steven Hoving, Stian Selnes, Thiago Santos, Thibault Saunier, Thijs |
| 1040 | Vermeir, Thomas Bluemel, Thomas Jones, Thomas Klausner, Thomas Scheuermann, |
| 1041 | Tim-Philipp Müller, Ting-Wei Lan, Tom Schoonjans, Ursula Maplehurst, Vanessa |
| 1042 | Chipirras Navalon, Víctor Manuel Jáquez Leal, Vincent Penquerc'h, Vineeth TM, |
| 1043 | Vivia Nikolaidou, Vootele Vesterblom, Wang Xin-yu (王昕宇), William Manley, |
| 1044 | Wim Taymans, Wonchul Lee, Xabier Rodriguez Calvar, Xavier Claessens, xlazom00, |
| 1045 | Yann Jouanin, Zaheer Abbas Merali |
| 1046 | |
| 1047 | ... and many others who have contributed bug reports, translations, sent |
| 1048 | suggestions or helped testing. |
| 1049 | |
| 1050 | ## Bugs fixed in 1.10 |
| 1051 | |
| 1052 | More than [750 bugs][bugs-fixed-in-1.10] have been fixed during |
| 1053 | the development of 1.10. |
| 1054 | |
| 1055 | This list does not include issues that have been cherry-picked into the |
| 1056 | stable 1.8 branch and fixed there as well, all fixes that ended up in the |
| 1057 | 1.8 branch are also included in 1.10. |
| 1058 | |
| 1059 | This list also does not include issues that have been fixed without a bug |
| 1060 | report in bugzilla, so the actual number of fixes is much higher. |
| 1061 | |
| 1062 | [bugs-fixed-in-1.10]: https://bugzilla.gnome.org/buglist.cgi?bug_status=RESOLVED&bug_status=VERIFIED&classification=Platform&limit=0&list_id=164074&order=bug_id&product=GStreamer&query_format=advanced&resolution=FIXED&target_milestone=1.8.1&target_milestone=1.8.2&target_milestone=1.8.3&target_milestone=1.8.4&target_milestone=1.9.1&target_milestone=1.9.2&target_milestone=1.9.90&target_milestone=1.10.0 |
| 1063 | |
| 1064 | ## Stable 1.10 branch |
| 1065 | |
| 1066 | After the 1.10.0 release there will be several 1.10.x bug-fix releases which |
| 1067 | will contain bug fixes which have been deemed suitable for a stable branch, |
| 1068 | but no new features or intrusive changes will be added to a bug-fix release |
| 1069 | usually. The 1.10.x bug-fix releases will be made from the git 1.10 branch, |
| 1070 | which is a stable branch. |
| 1071 | |
| 1072 | ### 1.10.0 |
| 1073 | |
| 1074 | 1.10.0 was released on 1st November 2016. |
| 1075 | |
| 1076 | ## Known Issues |
| 1077 | |
| 1078 | - iOS builds with iOS 6 SDK and old C++ STL. You need to select iOS 6 instead |
| 1079 | of 7 or 8 in your projects settings to be able to link applications. |
| 1080 | [Bug #766366](https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=766366) |
| 1081 | - Code signing for Apple platforms has some problems currently, requiring |
| 1082 | manual work to get your application signed. [Bug #771860](https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=771860) |
| 1083 | - Building applications with Android NDK r13 on Windows does not work. Other |
| 1084 | platforms and earlier/later versions of the NDK are not affected. |
| 1085 | [Bug #772842](https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=772842) |
| 1086 | - The new leaks tracer may deadlock the application (or exhibit other undefined |
| 1087 | behaviour) when `SIGUSR` handling is enabled via the `GST_LEAKS_TRACER_SIG` |
| 1088 | environment variable. [Bug #770373](https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=770373) |
| 1089 | - vp8enc crashes on 32 bit Windows, but was working fine in 1.6. 64 bit Windows is unaffected. |
| 1090 | [Bug #763663](https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=763663) |
| 1091 | |
| 1092 | ## Schedule for 1.12 |
| 1093 | |
| 1094 | Our next major feature release will be 1.12, and 1.11 will be the unstable |
| 1095 | development version leading up to the stable 1.12 release. The development |
| 1096 | of 1.11/1.12 will happen in the git master branch. |
| 1097 | |
| 1098 | The plan for the 1.12 development cycle is yet to be confirmed, but it is |
| 1099 | expected that feature freeze will be around early/mid-January, |
| 1100 | followed by several 1.11 pre-releases and the new 1.12 stable release |
| 1101 | in March. |
| 1102 | |
| 1103 | 1.12 will be backwards-compatible to the stable 1.10, 1.8, 1.6, 1.4, 1.2 and |
| 1104 | 1.0 release series. |
| 1105 | |
| 1106 | - - - |
| 1107 | |
| 1108 | *These release notes have been prepared by Olivier Crête, Sebastian Dröge, |
| 1109 | Nicolas Dufresne, Edward Hervey, Víctor Manuel Jáquez Leal, Tim-Philipp |
| 1110 | Müller, Reynaldo H. Verdejo Pinochet, Arun Raghavan, Thibault Saunier, |
| 1111 | Jan Schmidt, Wim Taymans, Matthew Waters* |
| 1112 | |
| 1113 | *License: [CC BY-SA 4.0](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)* |
| 1114 | |