Debug preference for testing H.264/MPEG-4 AVC in Firefox for Android

Aaron Train

Nightly for Android has recently adapted a new
about:config preference for using and more-so testing Android
H.264/MPEG-4 AVC decoding. The preference
is media.stagefright.omxcodec.flags

Utimately, this preference allows one to override whether Firefox uses
Android’s H.264/MPEG-4 AVC software or hardware decoder. As Chris
Peterson mentions in the same announcement, this is useful for
debugging different configurations and conveinent for testing.

Flags values to note:

  • 0 – Android will use either hardware or software decoding
    (default)
  • 8 – Force software decoding
  • 16 – Force hardware decoding

Reference: OMXCodec::CreationFlags