As we informed you earlier last year, GNOME received a €1M work commission from the Sovereign Tech Fund, a funding pot supported financially by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action.
And now, another vital component of the open-source ecosystem, GStreamer, is getting a significant investment of €203K from the same organization.
GStreamer: A Multimedia Powerhouse
GStreamer is a key component of the Open Source ecosystem. It’s renowned for its wide-ranging applications across numerous operating systems, media players, streaming apps, embedded devices, server products, browser engines, and, believe it or not, even in surgical microscopes and the International Space Station.
The Funding Focus
The current implementation of GStreamer’s RTP/RTCP, RTSP, and WebRTC, primarily written in C, has faced recurring security issues. These issues have demanded significant maintainer time and attention for fixes.
The STF’s investment aims to transition those critical components of the GStreamer multimedia framework from the C programming language to the memory-safety Rust, as the primary objective of this move is to enhance security, maintainability, and sustainability.
The STF’s funding will support Centricular in enhancing GStreamer by implementing:
- RTCP parsing and RTP session handling in Rust.
- RTP/AVPF profile support and real-time communication enhancements.
- Comprehensive audio and video format support, including RTP payloaders and depayloaders for formats like H.264, H.265, VP8, and VP9.
- Re-writing RTSP handling in Rust, focusing on essential features and live playback.
This shift to Rust is also seen as a sustainable solution to attract more contributors. Check out the STF’s announcement for more information.
