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Getting started

Requirements

  • NVIDIA Jetson (Xavier or Orin), JetPack 5.1.1+ (JP5) or JP6, GStreamer ≥ 1.16.
  • For host-side unit testing: any x86_64 with Docker (uses a mock NvBufSurface API).

Build (Jetson, native)

meson setup builddir -Dcpp_std=c++14 -Dbuildtype=debugoptimized -Dwerror=false
ninja -C builddir

The build auto-detects the real NVMM stack via pkg-config/library search. If NvBufSurface isn't found it errors unless you opt into the mock with -Dmock=true (host testing only — never production).

Build-time options (CUDA targets)

The CUDA elements (nvmmsamurai and its probes) take two combo options so a bad value is rejected at meson setup rather than deep inside nvcc:

Option Values Default Meaning
gpu_arch sm_72…sm_90 sm_87 GPU arch — sm_87 = Orin, sm_72 = Xavier; a mismatch makes kernels fail to launch
gpu_cxx_std c++17, c++20 c++20 C++ standard for the CUDA kernels (nvcc -std); drop to c++17 only for an older toolchain 
meson setup builddir -Dgpu_arch=sm_87 -Dgpu_cxx_std=c++20

Build & test (host, Docker, mock API)

docker build -f docker/Dockerfile.dev -t gst-nvmm-cpp:dev .
docker run --rm --shm-size=256m gst-nvmm-cpp:dev meson test -C builddir --verbose

Run the elements

Point GStreamer at the built plugins:

export GST_PLUGIN_PATH=$PWD/builddir/gst/nvmmconvert:$PWD/builddir/gst/nvmmsink:\
$PWD/builddir/gst/nvmmappsrc:$PWD/builddir/gst/nvmmalloc
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/tegra:$GST_PLUGIN_PATH

gst-inspect-1.0 nvmmconvert

A minimal VIC transform pipeline (CPU → NVMM → scale → back to CPU → JPEG):

gst-launch-1.0 videotestsrc num-buffers=1 pattern=smpte ! \
  'video/x-raw,width=1920,height=1080,format=I420' ! \
  nvvidconv ! 'video/x-raw(memory:NVMM),format=NV12' ! \
  nvmmconvert ! 'video/x-raw(memory:NVMM),width=640,height=480' ! \
  nvvidconv ! 'video/x-raw,format=I420' ! nvjpegenc ! filesink location=out.jpg

nvmmconvert/nvmmappsrc consume and emit video/x-raw(memory:NVMM). Use nvvidconv (VIC) — not videoconvert (CPU) — to cross the NVMM boundary.

Next steps