[FFmpeg-devel] Threading issue with avcodec_decode_video2 ?

[Don Moir]

>> Don Moir <donmoir <at> comcast.net> writes:
>>
>>>> Forgot to mention that abort seemed to be called as one
>>>> of the spurious crashes I was seeing before lock was in
>>>> place.

>>> As you know, we consider crashes important, so if you
>>> have a sample that crashes current FFmpeg (no matter if
>>> with abort() or differently), please either open a ticket
>>> on trac or send a mail to ffmpeg-user.
>
>> All crashes related to the issue in this email had to do with unsafe thread issue as detailed in email which can create spurious 
>> and seemingly unrelated crashes. It's not going to be reproducible with ffmpeg command line since its a multi-threaded issue.
>
>> Would be great if this could be addressed right away and will do what I can. We probably just need confirmation from Michael or 
>> Hendrik or whoever that it's ok to move the mentioned failing code into the init procedure. Also, whatever else this might effect 
>> and whatever else might be doing the same thing.

>patch for this is welcome

Yeah would love to supply a patch, but just not patch savvy and seems I never have to time to get that way.

I looked around for what code calls ff_msmpeg4_decode_init and ff_vc1_decode_init_alloc_tables.

Within avcodec both are called in only 2 places.

In mss2.c they are called in wmv9_init and as we know in vc1_dec.c they are called in vc1_decode_frame.

In wmv2dec.c only ff_msmpeg4_decode_init is called in its wmv2_decode_init function. ff_vc1_decode_init_alloc_tables is not called 
from code in wmv2dec.c directly.

vc1dec.c is the odd man out here and doesn't call these functions in its vc1_decode_init function and there are threading issues 
because of it.

In vc1dec.c there is a little more to it but not much.

    if (!s->context_initialized) {
        if (ff_msmpeg4_decode_init(avctx) < 0 || ff_vc1_decode_init_alloc_tables(v) < 0)
            return -1;
        s->low_delay = !avctx->has_b_frames || v->res_sprite;
        if (v->profile == PROFILE_ADVANCED) {
            s->h_edge_pos = avctx->coded_width;
            s->v_edge_pos = avctx->coded_height;
        }
    }

In mss2.c and wm2dec.c they just call init functions or function and thats it.

In vc1dec.c it calls the init functions and does a little more. The code under return -1; appears to be ok and seems to be happy in 
either vc1_decode_init or vc1_decode_frame, but "if (ff_msmpeg4_decode_init(avctx) < 0 || ff_vc1_decode_init_alloc_tables(v) < 0)" 
only seems to be happy in vc1_decode_init or when locked down.

Do you have a multi-threaded test case for this kind of thing ?