Editing GStreamer (section)

===Plug-ins===
GStreamer uses a [[Plug-in (computing)|plug-in]] architecture which makes the most of GStreamer's functionality implemented as [[Library (computing)|shared libraries]].<ref>{{citation |url=https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/modules/ |title=Overview of the modules |publisher=Gstreamer.freedesktop.org |access-date=8 February 2012 |archive-date=25 January 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120125050306/http://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/modules/ |url-status=live }}</ref> GStreamer's base functionality contains functions for registering and loading plug-ins and for providing the fundamentals of all classes in the form of [[base class]]es. Plug-in libraries get dynamically loaded to support a wide spectrum of [[codec]]s, [[container format (digital)|container format]]s, [[Device driver|input/output drivers]] and effects.

Plug-ins can be installed semi-automatically when they are first needed. For that purpose distributions can register a backend that resolves feature-descriptions to package-names.

Since version 0.9, the plug-ins come grouped into three sets (named after the film ''[[The Good, the Bad and the Ugly]]'').<ref>{{citation |url=https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/documentation/splitup.html |title=GStreamer 0.9 development series - Hung by a Thread |publisher=Gstreamer.freedesktop.org |access-date=24 February 2013 |archive-date=27 January 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130127081645/http://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/documentation/splitup.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Plug-in set name
! Description
|-
| Good
| This package contains the GStreamer plug-ins from the "good" set, a set of high quality plug-ins under the LGPL license.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/modules/gst-plugins-good.html |title=GStreamer Good Plug-ins |access-date=2019-02-05 |archive-date=2019-02-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190207020112/https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/modules/gst-plugins-good.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
|-
| Bad
| GStreamer Bad Plug-ins comprises a set of plug-ins not up-to-par compared to the rest. They might closely approach good-quality plug-ins, but they lack something: perhaps a good [[code review]], some documentation, a set of tests, a real live maintainer, or some actual wide use.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/modules/gst-plugins-bad.html |title=GStreamer Bad Plug-ins |access-date=2019-02-05 |archive-date=2019-02-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190207020406/https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/modules/gst-plugins-bad.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
|-
| Ugly
| This package contains plug-ins from the "ugly" set, a set of good-quality plug-ins that might pose distribution problems.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/modules/gst-plugins-ugly.html |title=GStreamer Ugly Plug-ins |access-date=2019-02-05 |archive-date=2019-02-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190207015847/https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/modules/gst-plugins-ugly.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
|}

Individual distributions may further sub-classify these plug-ins: for example [[Ubuntu]] groups the "bad" and "ugly" sets into the "Universe" or the [[Universe ubuntu|"Multiverse"]] components.

In addition, there is a '''GStreamer FFmpeg plug-in''' (called ''gst-libav'' for historic reasons<ref>{{Cite web |title=subprojects/gst-libav/README.md · 47ac79d7b8cc078f4890d0ce21f47e1c1af2c736 · GStreamer / gstreamer · GitLab |url=https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gstreamer/-/blob/47ac79d7b8cc078f4890d0ce21f47e1c1af2c736/subprojects/gst-libav/README.md |access-date=2022-07-12 |website=GitLab |date=24 September 2021 |language=en}}</ref>) that extends the number of supported media formats.

====Video acceleration====
[[File:GStreamer and TI DMAI.svg|thumb|Through special plugins provided by Texas Instruments, GStreamer makes use of hardware acceleration provided by e.g. [[Texas Instruments DaVinci]].]]

There are various [[Semiconductor intellectual property core|SIP blocks]] that can do the computations to decode certain video codecs, such as [[Nvidia PureVideo|PureVideo]], [[Unified Video Decoder|UVD]], [[Intel Quick Sync Video|QuickSync Video]], [[OMAP 4|TI Ducati]] and more. Such needs to be supported by the [[device driver]], which in turn provides one or multiple [[Application programming interface|interfaces]], like [[Video Decode and Presentation API for Unix|VDPAU]], [[Video Acceleration API|VAAPI]], [[Distributed Codec Engine]] or [[DirectX Video Acceleration|DXVA]] to end-user software like MPlayer to access this hardware and offload computation to it.

* It is possible to use [[Video Coding Engine]] with GStreamer through the [[OpenMAX IL]] wrapper plugin {{mono|gst-omx}}.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/releases/gst-omx/1.0.0.html |title=GStreamer OpenMAX IL wrapper plugin |website=gstreamer.freedesktop.org |access-date=2017-07-21 |archive-date=2017-07-10 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170710025641/https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/releases/gst-omx/1.0.0.html |url-status=live }}</ref> This is for example possible on the [[Raspberry Pi]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=34250&p=599066&hilit=gstreamer#p599066|title=Gstreamer 1.0 for raspbian|website=GRaspberrypi.org|access-date=2017-07-21|archive-date=2017-07-10|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170710095711/https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=34250&p=599066&hilit=gstreamer#p599066|url-status=live}}</ref>
* The [[Semiconductor intellectual property core|SIP core]] present on some [[Texas Instruments]] SoCs is also accessible through GStreamer: {{mono|gst-dmai}}, {{mono|gst-openmax}}, {{mono|gst-dsp}}.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://processors.wiki.ti.com/index.php/GStreamer|title=GStreamer Plug-ins for TI hardware|website=Processors.wiki.ti.com|access-date=2017-07-21|archive-date=2017-06-28|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170628173254/http://processors.wiki.ti.com/index.php/GStreamer|url-status=live}}</ref>
* [[Video Decode and Presentation API for Unix|VDPAU]] and [[Video Acceleration API|VAAPI]] are supported with [[GNOME Videos]] >= 2.28.0 and GStreamer >= 0.10.26 since 2010<ref>{{cite web|url=http://eu.fluendo.com/press/fluendo-codec-pack-release-11-keeping-technologies-fast-pace/ |archive-url=https://archive.today/20140624184008/http://eu.fluendo.com/press/fluendo-codec-pack-release-11-keeping-technologies-fast-pace/ |url-status=dead |archive-date=2014-06-24 |title=Fluendo Codec Pack Release 11 bring VDPAU and VAAPI support |date=2010-03-25 }}</ref>
* [[Broadcom Crystal HD]] is supported<ref>{{cite web |author=Debian Webmaster|url=https://packages.debian.org/wheezy/gstreamer0.10-crystalhd |title=Debian - Details of package gstreamer0.10-crystalhd in wheezy |website=Packages.debian.org |access-date=2017-07-21 |archive-date=2017-06-29 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170629060143/https://packages.debian.org/wheezy/gstreamer0.10-crystalhd |url-status=live }}</ref>

====Media formats====
The Good, Bad and Ugly GStreamer plugins mentioned earlier provide, alongside processing elements/filters of all kinds, support for a wide variety of file formats, protocols and multimedia codecs.<!--

TODO - this section should have a list of formats/codecs provided specifically by gstreamer, see also https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=698589

--> In addition to those, support for more than a hundred compression formats (including [[MPEG-1]], [[MPEG-2]], [[MPEG-4]], [[H.261]], [[H.263]], [[H.264/MPEG-4 AVC|H.264]], [[RealVideo]], [[MP3]], [[Windows Media Video|WMV]], etc.<ref>{{Cite web |title=subprojects/gst-libav/ext/libav/gstavcodecmap.c · 47ac79d7b8cc078f4890d0ce21f47e1c1af2c736 · GStreamer / gstreamer · GitLab |url=https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/gstreamer/gstreamer/-/blob/47ac79d7b8cc078f4890d0ce21f47e1c1af2c736/subprojects/gst-libav/ext/libav/gstavcodecmap.c |access-date=2022-07-12 |website=GitLab |date=16 January 2022 |language=en}}</ref>) is transparently provided through the ''gst-libav'' plug-in.