[FFmpeg-devel] Plugins architecture

[Jacob Lifshay]

On August 11, 2025 5:22:26 AM PDT, Lynne <dev at lynne.ee> wrote:
> I would like to hear other options or suggestions that developers may have, and ultimately, if there's a consensus on the amount of options that that the project would benefit from having a plugins interface, a vote on the type of interface(s) we would maintain.

I think it would be good to have some sort of plugin architecture that doesn't require the version of ffmpeg you're using to contain a reference to your source code, this allows you to more easily backport new formats/codecs/etc. to older ffmpeg releases. I'd be fine with having ffmpeg maintain a repository of plugins (could be in ffmpeg's repo, or separate) as long as you can point ffmpeg to a later version of the repository than the version of ffmpeg you're currently building. you'd also want to be able to use a local checkout of that repository of plugins so you can test a new plugin that isn't in ffmpeg's repository yet.

Jacob