simaaiencoder

The simaaiencoder GStreamer plugin provides video encoding capabilities using the SiMa.ai hardware accelerator. This plugin allows you to integrate SiMa.ai’s encoding functionality seamlessly into your GStreamer pipelines.

Properties

The plugin exposes several properties to configure the encoding process:

Property Name	Type	Default Value	Description
enc-width	int	1920	Input resolution width.
enc-height	int	1080	Input resolution height.
enc-frame-rate	int	30	Frame rate for encoding.
ip-queue-max-buffers	int	30	High watermark for the input queue (works only in ASYNC mode). If the queue size exceeds this value, it will block.
enc-bitrate	int	0	Bitrate in kbps. Choose a value appropriate for your resolution (e.g., 1000-2000 kbps for 640x480, 2500-4000 kbps for 1280x720, 5000-7000 kbps for 1920x1080).
ip-queue-min-buffers	int	15	Low watermark for the input queue (works only in ASYNC mode).
enc-profile	string	main	H.264 (baseline, main, high) & H.265 (main) profile.
enc-level	string	4.0	H.264/H.265 level (e.g., 4.0, 4.1, 4.2, 5.0, 5.1, 5.2). The encoder may adjust the level automatically in ASYNC mode if the provided level is insufficient.
enc-type	string	h264	Encoder type: h264 or h265.
enc-ip-mode	string	async	Encoder input mode: async or sync.
enc-fmt	string	NV12	Input encoder format: NV12 or YUV420P.
dump-cnt	int	0	Number of encoded frames to dump to file (for debugging).
dump-path	string	/tmp	Path to dump encoded frames.
ignore-caps-event	boolean	FALSE	Ignore caps negotiation if the previous plugin sends incorrect caps.
ip-cache-inval	boolean	FALSE	Invalidate the input buffer cache before reading (if mapped as cached). Requires custom meta with sima-mem-ptr.
ip-rate-ctrl	boolean	FALSE	Enable input buffer rate control. Only use if your source is not rate-controlled (e.g., YUV filesrc).
transmit	boolean	FALSE	Transmit KPI messages.

Usage

The simaaiencoder plugin integrates into a GStreamer pipeline like this:

gst-launch-1.0 filesrc location=/path/to/your/video.mp4 ! decodebin ! videoconvert ! simaaiencoder enc-width=1280 enc-height=720 enc-bitrate=3000 ! h264parse ! filesink location=/path/to/output.mp4

Replace /path/to/your/video.mp4 and /path/to/output.mp4 with the actual paths. Adjust other properties as needed. Remember that the input video needs to be in a format that the decodebin can handle.

For Async mode:

gst-launch-1.0 videotestsrc ! videoconvert ! simaaiencoder enc-ip-mode=async enc-width=640 enc-height=480 enc-bitrate=1000 ! h264parse ! fakesink

Installation

To install the simaaiencoder plugin, copy the plugin file from /usr/local/simaai/plugin_zoo/gst-simaai-plugins-base/gst/ into your project’s plugins/ directory. Ensure the necessary SiMa.ai libraries are installed and configured on your system.