Design Check Lists: HW Design Checking List for i.MX6DQSDL HW Design Checking List for i.Mx53 Hardware Design Checklist for i.MX28 HW_Design_Checking_List_for_i.MX6SoloX i.MX6UL Hardware design checklist   DDR Design Tool: I.MX53 DDR3 Script Aid imx53 DDR stress tester V0.042 i.Mx6DQSDL DDR3 Script Aid MX6DQP DDR3 Script Aid i.Mx6DQSDL LPDDR2 Script Aid i.Mx6SL LPDDR2 Script Aid i.MX6SX DDR3 Script Aid I.MX6UL DDR3 Script Aid i.MX6UL_LPDDR2_Script_Aid i.MX6ULL_DDR3_Script_Aid  i.MX6ULL_LPDDR2_Script_Aid  MX6SLL_LPDDR2_Script_Aid  MX6SLL_LPDDR3_Script_Aid  i.MX6 DDR Stress Test Tool V1.0.3 i.MX6/7 DDR Stress Test Tool V3.00 i.MX8MSCALE DDR Tool Release  i.MX8M DDR3L register programming aid  i.MX 8/8X Family DDR Tools Release   Application Notes: MX_Design_Validation_Guide I.MX6 series USB Certification Guides

1. Set up HDMI Set up your kernel to use HDMI adding the following code to bootargs on u-boot: video=mxcfb0:dev=hdmi,1920x1080M@60,if=RGB24 2. Test raw audio In order to test only raw audio, use the following command: aplay -D hw:1,0 Kaleidoscope.wav 3. Make HDMI audio the default output In order to configure audio output over HDMI, please, replace content of file ~/.asoundrc to the following one pcm.dmix_48000{      type dmix      ipc_key 5678293      ipc_key_add_uid yes      slave{           pcm "hw:1,0"           period_time 0           period_size 2048           buffer_size 24576           format S16_LE           rate 48000      } } pcm.!dsnoop_44100{      type dsnoop      ipc_key 5778293      ipc_key_add_uid yes      slave{           pcm "hw:0,0"           period_time 0           period_size 2048           buffer_size 24576           format S16_LE           rate 44100      } } pcm.!dsnoop_48000{      type dsnoop      ipc_key 5778293      ipc_key_add_uid yes      slave{           pcm "hw:1,0"           period_time 0           period_size 2048           buffer_size 24576           format S16_LE           rate 48000      } } pcm.asymed{      type asym      playback.pcm "dmix_48000"      capture.pcm "dsnoop_44100" } pcm.dsp0{      type plug      slave.pcm "asymed" } pcm.!default{      type plug      route_policy "average"      slave.pcm "asymed" } ctl.mixer0{      type hw      card 0 } This will configure alsa to use sound card hw:1,0. Please, pay attention to use the proper audio card name for your device. In order to see available sound cards on board: root@imx53qsb:~# aplay -l **** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices **** card 0: imx3stack [imx-3stack], device 0: SGTL5000 SGTL5000-0 []   Subdevices: 1/1   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0 card 1: imx3stackspdif [imx-3stack-spdif], device 0: IMX SPDIF mxc spdif-0 []   Subdevices: 1/1   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0 For detail on how to create asound.conf, please see alsa-lib configuration introduction. 4. Encoded audio For encoded (i.e. AC3, DTS) audio, you can use, for example, ac3dec, an utility provided by alsa-tools with the following command line: ac3dec -D hw:1,0 -C test.ac3 This would work for both HDMI audio and SPDIF audio. Double check your hardware and/or schematic in order to know which one to use.

Hi all, I shared my test results and solutions in attachments. Best regards, Carl

When to improve kernel booting using hibernation [1], I found kernel initialized each component [2] took too much time. One solution is to remove unnecessary module to save time. Another approach is to delay those modules until user space up. Then it won’t lost some features just because hopes to gain benefit on booting speed. This is very useful since hibernation’s trigger point is at the late_initcall [3]. Kernel doesn't need do much module initialize since hibernate will restore those module status later. The detailed implementation is in the attached patch. [1]: hibernation is a technique to store system memory content to storage. Then the device can be shutdown and read the content back after power on. [2]: component means subsystem or driver. [3]: Consult kernel/power/hibernate.c, software_resume

The refine to TV mode of R10.3.1 causes dual video function fail. The attached patch recovers dual video function. Attached dual_video.patch only work for RGB output (HDMI support). For legacy TVout (YUV output), the extra patch is necessary, see the attached "legacy_tvout.zip". Refer to Dual video with single UI on i.MX53 SMD with Android R10.4  for setup.

Linphone is an internet phone or Voice Over IP phone (VoIP). With Linphone you can communicate freely with people over the internet, with voice, video, and text instant messaging. Linphone makes use of the SIP protocol, an open standard for internet telephony. You can use Linphone with any SIP VoIP operator, including our free SIP audio/video service. Linphone is free software (or open-source), you can download and redistribute it freely. Linphone is available for desktop computers: Linux, Windows, Mac OSX, and for mobile phones: Android, iPhone, Blackberry. Linphone-android is a good example to show the integration of Java code based on Android SDK with native CODEC, network protocols. Not like XBMC-Android that is almost total c++/c project. Perform the following steps to build a linphone-android project: 1. git clone git://git.linphone.org/linphone-android.git --recursive 2. sudo apt-get install autoconf automake libtool pkg-config 3. "cd" to the root of "git clone" : cd /home/user/linphne-android // wherver git'ed linphone-android is 4. export PATH=/home/user/android-ndk:$PATH //wherever your android-ndk, android-sdk tools, and platform-tools, and ANT are stored in.             For example on my PC.      export PATH=/home/alanz/android-ndk-r8d:/home/alanz/android-sdk-linux/tools:/home/alanz/android-sdk-linux/platform-     tools:/home/alanz/bin/apache-ant-1.8.4/bin:$PATH             Note: PATH contains the ndk, sdk, and ant. 5. Make sure the network is working, then execute "./prepare_sources.sh" at the linphone-android root 6. Then, execute "/home/alanz/android-ndk-r8d/ndk-build", it will take a while to be finished 7. Modify Makefile as following example, modify it accordingly.      NDK_PATH=/home/alanz/android-ndk-r8d      SDK_PATH=/home/alanz/android-sdk-linux/tools      SDK_PLATFORM_TOOLS_PATH=/home/alanz/android-sdk-linux/platform-tools      .....................      generate-libs:           $(NDK_PATH)/ndk-build ....... (remove -j$(NUMCPUS) by the end of this command line) 8. execute "make", after finish, the apk file can be found under bin/ subdirectory.

Based on example code provided in AN4466 I've written a simple memory calibration script for ARM DS-5 that runs same steps and prints out results for DQS, read and write calibration. This script can be run on new boards in order to find optimum calibration settings for the memory controller. Prior to running this script it is necessary to run standard memory initialization script! When bringing up new board: obtain default memory initialization script for memory type you're using (for example from DDR stress tester package) and modify the memory controller settings according to memory device you are going to use. run DDR stress tester with the given configuration on target frequency you're going to use to make memory works with given settings (default values for calibration are  fine in most cases unless there's issues with PCB and/or routing). run memory init script and then the attached script to obtain calibrated values. Re-test Vladan

This PDF is training material for showing examples on video encoding, video decoding, video streaming on an i.MX53QSB board.

Q: ”We noticed that the specified risetime of this signal is max 5nS, while the Sable board schematic shows it driven from open collector/drain using only the 100k haulup provided in the chip. This will have risetimes of 10‘s (if not 100‘s!) of ns. The worrying thing is that the latest datasheet update specifically clarifies this rise time spec, so presumably it‘s considered important. Which is right? If the rise time spec needs to be met, we need a small haul up resistor or an active drive. In that case what rail should be used to haul/drive POR_B high?” It appears to be correct, and what is interesting I checked the PFUZE timing in the datasheet ”tr4 Rise time of RESETBMCU - 0.2 ms” Device: i.MX6Q OS: Linux Dev Board: i.MX6Q SDB A: The 5ns rise/fall time requirement does not apply to i.MX6. This was probably carried over from the i.MX53 where it was required. This will be removed from the datasheet but it will likely not be until the September time frame. We're not doing an update to any of the electrical parameters of the datasheet right now.

In FSL i.MX53 reference design, it is configured as: static struct mxc_audio_platform_data sgtl5000_data = { .ssi_num = 1, .src_port = 2, .ext_port = 5, .hp_irq = gpio_to_irq(HEADPHONE_DEC_B), .hp_status = headphone_det_status, .init = mxc_sgtl5000_init, .ext_ram_rx = 1, }; by default. If change the configuration to be : static struct mxc_audio_platform_data sgtl5000_data = { .ssi_num = 0, .src_port = 1, .ext_port = 5, .hp_irq = gpio_to_irq(HEADPHONE_DEC_B), .hp_status = headphone_det_status, .init = mxc_sgtl5000_init, .ext_ram_rx = 1, }; There will prompt "imx_ssi_irq mxc_ssi SISR 8003a3 SIER 180100 fifo_errs=XXXX"  constantly, and audio is greatly distorted. The root cause of this issue is that SSI1/3 use SDMA, and also use IPMUX, but there is not the clock dependency between SDMA and IPMUX, so sometimes IPMUX clock is closed automatically. The attached patch may fix this issue. NOTE: If use SSI2 .ssi_num = 1,             .src_port = 2, If use SSI1 .ssi_num = 0,             .src_port = 1,

Qt framework Qt is a cross-platform complete development framework with tools designed to streamline the creation of stunning native applications and amazing user interfaces for desktop, embedded and mobile platforms. Qt's cross-platform full framework and tools enables developers to target various desktop, embedded, mobile and real-time operating systems with one code base. Qt brings freedom to the developer saving development time, adding efficiency and ultimately shortening time to market. Building Qt Compile Qt for i.MX28 Building QT5 for i.MX53 Building QT for i.MX6 Qt on iMX6 Installing tools Installing and Configuring QT Creator (Ubuntu) Qt5 with Qt3D over Wayland rootfs Demos Qt5 Cinematic Experience Demo on i.MX6 Video - IMx 53 Qt5 qt3d demo Qt5 with Qt3D over Wayland rootfs Information Qt5 on i.MX6  DO's and DONT's Best Practices for QML

In L2.6.35_11.09.01_ER BSP Uboot, the MMC driver was updated, but there is issue that when you modified some uboot code, the MMC driver has chance to fail to work. The root cause is that mmc->has_init hasn't been initialized. Sometimes the value will be not zero, then mmc driver will be skipped for initialization. Attached is the patch to fix this issue in L2.6.35_11.09.01_ER BSP Uboot.

Question: When working with v1.6.0.55 using the standard profile for i.MX35 the tool fails most of the time when transferring the target root file system, on v1.6.0.42 it works just fine. The tags on the internal git don’t clearly mention a tool version, but a BSP. Wwhat are the differences between v1.6.0.55 and v1.6.0.42? Or to which tag(or commit) they correspond on git? Answer: 1.6.042 commit by looking at "Apps/MfgTool.exe/docs/changelog.txt": 1ca2a16df736ac51979a67423fef6a09bed6b7e2 And 1.6.055: "06a4f9190e34297b7273fc4bb4a92737e5bc837f"

Enabling Dual Display in Ubuntu with the i.MX53 Quick Start Board Here you will learn how to enable two displays in a Ubuntu system running in an iMX53 Quick Start Board. We assume here that you already have a micro SD card with a valid Ubuntu image (including uboot, Linux kernel and Ubuntu filesystem). You can use the original SD card that comes with the i.MX53 Quick Start Board, which brings an image of Ubuntu or, if you do not have the original SD card, you can reproduce it by downloading Ubuntu binaries package (L2.6.35_MX53_ER_1101_IMAGE) from Freescale iMX53qsb download area. You will also need to update U-boot and kernel binaries in the SD card with more recent images. You can find the most recent binaries (L2.6.35_MX53_ER_1109_IMAGE_) from Freescale iMX53qsb download area as well. Introduction To enable dual display, you need to perform two tasks: Enable two displays at kernel level Configure your Xorg server accordingly Enabling Two Displays at Kernel Level To enable two displays at kernel level means to map one display interface to fb0 device and the other to fb1 device. So first thing is to choose which interface will be the primary one, mapped as fb0. As an example, we consider the VGA interface as primary in this tutorial. Second thing is to choose one of the other available external video interfaces to be secondary, mapped as fb1 device in the system. We consider the 4.3" seiko LCD display in this tutorial as the secondary interface. Once chosen primary and secondary interfaces, we need to configure kernel video arguments accordingly. The arguments are available in specific variables in the U-boot that comes with the Ubuntu binaries. You can see them (HDMI, VGA, etc.) by printing the U-boot environment variables from the U-boot shell, but you will probably not find those variables in other versions of U-boot and their contents will probably need to be adapted to the kernel version in use, as arguments recognized by kernel modules varies considerably between kernel versions. You can always refer to the Linux Release Notes documents for video arguments. It's available for each Linux BSP that can be found on the Freescale website. For the 1109 BSP, we have the following video arguments (extracted from i.MX53_START_Linux_BSP_Release_Note.pdf that comes with L2.6.35_11.09.01_ER_docs.tar.gz downloaded from here - IMX53_1109_LINUXDOCS_BUNDLE😞 VGA: video=mxcdi1fb:GBR24,VGA-XGA di1_primary vga SEIKO LCD: video=mxcdi0fb:RGB24,SEIKO-WVGA di0_primary Both are considered primary, because these are the arguments for single display setups. Now that we have video arguments for both desired interfaces, we only need to merge them together removing the primary argument from the one that is the secondary. In our case, we need to pass the following arguments to the kernel: video=mxcdi1fb:GBR24,VGA-XGA di1_primary vga video=mxcdi0fb:RGB24,SEIKO-WVGA For this, we can add these arguments to one of the variables that are used in the boot process. We can add the content to bootarg_base, for instance. In the U-boot command line, execute following commands to setup the environment: setenv vga_and_seiko 'video=mxcdi1fb:GBR24,VGA-XGA di1_primary vga video=mxcdi0fb:RGB24,SEIKO-WVGA' setenv bootargs_base 'setenv bootargs console=ttymxc0,115200 vga_and_seiko' saveenv After applying a reset and booting the board, you shall have both interfaces enabled, but the secondary will not be used by the Xorg server until we complete the next step. Configuring Xorg Server Now that we have two video interfaces properly configured and mapped to /dev/fb0 and /dev/fb1 devices, we need to tell Xorg server how to use them. Here is an example of xorg.conf file that you can use to replace the default one, found at /etc/X11: Section "InputDevice" Identifier     "Generic Keyboard" Driver          "kbd" Option          "XkbRules"     "xorg" Option          "XkbModel"     "pc105" Option          "XkbLayout"     "us" EndSection  Section "InputDevice" Identifier     "Configured Mouse" Driver          "mouse" Option          "CorePointer" EndSection  Section "Device" Identifier     "i.MX Accelerated Framebuffer Device 0" Driver          "imx" Option          "fbdev"               "/dev/fb0"  # This option only recognized when "mxc_epdc_fb" frame buffer driver in # use.  Values are "RGB565" (default, 16-bit RGB), "Y8" (8-bit gray), # and "Y8INV" (8-bit gray inverted). Option          "FormatEPDC"               "Y8INV"  EndSection  Section "Device" Identifier     "i.MX Accelerated Framebuffer Device 1" Driver          "imx" Option          "fbdev"               "/dev/fb1"  EndSection  Section "Monitor" Identifier     "Configured Monitor 0" EndSection  Section "Monitor" Identifier     "Configured Monitor 1" EndSection  Section "Screen" Identifier     "Screen 0" Monitor          "Configured Monitor 0" Device          "i.MX Accelerated Framebuffer Device 0"  # These "Display" SubSection's are needed for working with the # "mxc_epdc_fb" frame buffer driver. SubSection     "Display" Depth     8 Visual     "StaticGray" EndSubSection SubSection     "Display" Depth     16 Visual     "TrueColor" EndSubSection EndSection  Section "Screen" Identifier     "Screen 1" Monitor          "Configured Monitor 1" Device          "i.MX Accelerated Framebuffer Device 1" EndSection  Section "ServerLayout" Identifier     "Xinerama Layout" Screen          "Screen 0" Screen          "Screen 1" RightOf "Screen 0" EndSection  Section "ServerFlags" Option          "Xinerama"          "true" EndSection Results The following picture shows the i.MX 53 QSB running the extended desktop previously configured. You can see the VGA monitor with a Firefox instance and the SEIKO LCD display with a calc instance.

The following document contains a list of document, questions and discussions that are relevant in the community based on amount of views. If you are having a problem, doubt or getting started in i.MX processors, you should check the following links to see if your doubt is in there. Yocto Project Freescale Yocto Project main page‌ Yocto Training - HOME‌ i.MX Yocto Project: Frequently Asked Questions‌ Useful bitbake commands‌ Yocto Project Package Management - smart  How to add a new layer and a new recipe in Yocto  Setting up the Eclipse IDE for Yocto Application Development Guide to the .sdcard format  Yocto NFS & TFTP boot  YOCTO project clean  Yocto with a package manager (ex: apt-get)  Yocto Setting the Default Ethernet address and disable DHCP on boot.  i.MX x Building QT for i.MX6  i.MX6/7 DDR Stress Test Tool V3.00  i.MX6DQSDL DDR3 Script Aid  Installing Ubuntu Rootfs on NXP i.MX6 boards  iMX6DQ MAX9286 MIPI CSI2 720P camera surround view solution for Linux BSP i.MX Design&Tool Lists  Simple GPIO Example - quandry  i.MX6 GStreamer-imx Plugins - Tutorial & Example Pipelines  Streaming USB Webcam over Network  Step-by-step: How to setup TI Wilink (WL18xx) with iMX6 Linux 3.10.53  Linux / Kernel Copying Files Between Windows and Linux using PuTTY  Building Linux Kernel  Patch to support uboot logo keep from uboot to kernel for NXP Linux and Android BSP (HDMI, LCD and LVDS)  load kernel from SD card in U-boot  Changing the Kernel configuration for i.MX6 SABRE  Android  The Android Booting process  What is inside the init.rc and what is it used for.  Others How to use qtmultimedia(QML) with Gstreamer 1.0

BSP version: 11.03 Multimedia Package version: 11.03 1. Install BSP and Multi Media package (11.03 release) 2. Avoid Display Timeout: append the following line to rootfs/etc/oprofile: echo -e -n '\033[9]' > /dev/tty0 3. Set VGA port as the primary display in the kernel command line: video=mxcdi1fb:GBR24,VGA-XGA di1_primary vga 4. Connect a VGA monitor and WVGA display to the MX53 Quick Start 5. Boot Linux on MX53 Quick Start board (NFS is used in this example) 6. Unblank WVGA display (fb1): $ echo 0 > /sys/class/graphics/fb1/blank 7. On the target enter into /dev/shm directory. If the following files are present: vss_lock vss_shmem ,delete them. 8. On your host, edit the ltib/rootfs/usr/share/vssconfig as following: vss device definition Master=VGA, Slave=WVGA master display [VGA] type = framebuffer format = RGBP fb_num = 2 main_fb_num = 0 vs_max = 4 slave display [WVGA] type = framebuffer format = RGBP fb_num = 1 vs_max = 4 9. Run the Gstreamer pipeline below: gst-launch filesrc location=file.mp4 ! qtdemux ! mfw_vpudecoder ! mfw_isink display=VGA display-1=WVGA Video is played on the VGA and WVGA panels. A 720p file can be played at the same time.

File related to the following question: MX53 u-boot Splash Screen support

Qt Creator can be a very good IDE in order to develop great QT applications. This IDE does not only helps with syntax highlighting, access to examples and tutorials, but also helps you to configure different toolchains Qt binary versions and target options. First download the binary installer from: For 32 bits: $ wget http://releases.qt-project.org/qtcreator/2.6.2/qt-creator-linux-x86-opensource-2.6.2.bin For 64 bits: $ wget http://releases.qt-project.org/qtcreator/2.6.2/qt-creator-linux-x86_64-opensource-2.6.2.bin execute the binary $ ./qt-creator-linux-x86_64-opensource-2.6.2.bin Follow the Installer GUI and choose a location. Default options should be OK. in my case the installation was done here: $ /home/b35153/qtcreator-2.6.2/bin Open Qt Creator (in my case from command line, use "&" to regain control of the terminal) $./qtcreator & Open Tools -> Options Choose Build & Run  on the menu of the left. and Select the Compilers Tab Here you can add the toolchain GCC compiler of your convenience. It will appear in the "Manual"  section. Now click on Qt Version Tab.  Here you can add the Qmake that you had created with your Qt installation; for example, the Qt5 installation described here: Building QT for i.MX6 It will appear in the Manual section. In my case I have Qmake for PC and Qmake for i.MX6. Now click on Kits Tab Here you can create combinations of Compilers and Qmake, and also specify where do you want the executables to go. In my case here I combined the i.MX6 toolchain and the Qmake for I.MX6 i had created. I did not set up device configuration since the sysroot is already shared to my device via NFS, but you can configure it so the files are sent via ssh to your device. And that's It! Next time you load a project you can choose which Kit you want to work on, and it will be compiled just as you need.

Questions: 1.  Are there any hardware limitations (such as in the Host Controller IP block itself, how this IP block was implemented or in the DMA engine) to how many device endpoints the i.MX53 can handle on Host2 or Host3?  The Reference Manual notes that the OTG controller supports up to 8 endpoints but does not provide information on the Host Controller. 2.  Do any of the device validation tests for verifying the i.MX53 design (or USB cert tests) test compatibility/performance with multiple devices and multiple endpoints? 3.  What are the maximum number of endpoints Freescale has tested with? Problem Background: During extensive testing the customer observes 100% CPU utilization with only 6 endpoints (can be a combination of multi-endpoint devices or single-endpoint devices - see below for test configuration details) using our latest Linux reference BSP (2.6.35 Kernel).  They have tested with the Adeneo WEC7 BSP and the open source Linux kernel based on 3.11 for the QSB and have observed similar performance limitations. This has been tested with multiple packet sizes and device/endpoint configurations and no impact has been shown in varying these parameters. The customer did note that they are only receiving/processing a single interrupt at the 1ms boundary regardless of the number of devices/endpoints.  Processing this interrupt takes approximately 23us for one device and an additional 17us for each additional device endpoint after the first that is processed. The customer hardware configuration for their testing looks something like this: On the customer's board: [i.MX53 Host2/Host3] -> [SMSC 3315 USB High Speed ULPI PHY] -> [SMSC LAN9514 On-board 4-port USB 2.0 HS Hub] External: [SMSC LAN9514 Port #1] -> [SMSC USB2415 4-Port USB 2.0 HS Hub] -> Medical device w/ endpoints #1-4 [SMSC LAN9514 Port #2] -> [SMSC USB2415 4-Port USB 2.0 HS Hub] -> Medical device w/ endpoints #5-8 [SMSC LAN9514 Port #3] ->  Medical device w/ endpoint #9 [SMSC LAN9514 Port #4] ->  Medical device w/ endpoint #10 Answer: Hosts do not have endpoints. Only devices have endpoints. EHCI compliance hosts, like all i.MX devices, use a linked list of queues (for bulk/control transport). Each queue has a queuehead that represents a corresponding endpoint and has the endpoint's capabilities. On the queue are transfer descriptors that have the information of which data is to be moved to/from the endpoint of the device. All of this is in main memory and read/written under DMA.  There is no limit on how many devices/endpoints a host can service, other than the amount of available main memory (DRAM). The CPU has to build the linked lists, but this is  normally not taking much bandwidth. My guess at this time is that there may be a problem in the USB driver, or the application that is using the driver, or a problem with data alignment. For efficient operation, data must be aligned on 32-bit boundaries. Buffers are best aligned on 64-byte boundaries.

GStreamer has a simple feature to enable tracing, allowing the developer to do basic debugging. These can be done in two ways: Adding the parameter --gst-debug=LIST to the pipeline (a pipeline is a executed gst-launch command) Prepending the environment variable GST_DEBUG=LIST' LIST is a a comma-separated argument, indicating the GStreamer elements to trace. For example, if one needs to trace the sink element      $ GST_DEBUG=*sink*:5 gst-launch playbin2 uri=file:///sample.avi or      $ gst-launch playbin2 uri=file:///sample.avi --gst-debug=*sink*:5 Both commands produces the same log. In case want to trace for than one element, so can simple add the <element>:5, for example      $ GST_DEBUG=mfw_v4lsink:5,vpudec:5 gst-launch playbin2 uri=file:///sample.avi The number 5 indicates the log category, where 5 is the highest (the most verbose log you can get) and 0 produces no output (5=LOG, 4=DEBUG, 3=INFO, 2=WARN, 1=ERROR). Log can be huge in each pipeline run. One way to filter it is using the grep command. Before grepping, one needs to redirect the standard error to the standard output (GStreamer log goes always to stderr), so      $ GST_DEBUG=mfw_v4lsink:5,vpudec:5 gst-launch playbin2 uri=file:///sample.avi 2>&1 | grep <filter string> In case the log needs to be shared, it is important to remove the 'color' of the log, again, one just needs to add the parameter --gst-debug-no-color or prepend the env variable GST_DEBUG_NO_COLOR=1 ----- More shell variables that GStreamer react, can be found here https://developer.gnome.org/gstreamer/0.10/gst-running.html