jetson-video-capability

name	jetson-video-capability
license	Apache-2.0
description	Use when Jetson codec, profile, chroma, bit-depth, dimension, engine-count, or operational support must be reconciled using live SDK APIs, authenticated NVIDIA samples, and NVIDIA documentation. Also use for Jetson questions about Netflix, Widevine, or other DRM-protected streaming-service playback to apply the codec-scope boundary.
metadata	{"author":"Vinit Bansal <[e-mail]>","tags":["jetson","video-codec-sdk","pynvvideocodec","nvenc","nvdec","capability"],"languages":["python"],"data-classification":"public"}

Jetson Video Capability

Purpose

Answer Video Codec SDK and PyNvVideoCodec support questions without confusing an API response, a successful operation, and product documentation. Query the live target first, retain exact operation evidence separately, and publish the final product-support verdict from applicable NVIDIA documentation.

Prerequisites

• Fresh evidence from jetson-video-setup is an optional authority, not a prerequisite. When it is supplied, authenticate and use it exactly. When it is absent, this skill authenticates only the selected installed surface: package-owned native sources and requested report targets, or the exact invoking PyNvVideoCodec interpreter and wheel. It never installs, repairs, scans for a venv, or imports setup code. A fresh environment artifact that the agent obtains from setup's public read-only probe counts as supplied evidence; it need not originate in the customer's prompt.
• Run live queries on the target Jetson with direct GPU access. Do not claim current availability from an x86 host or a result copied from another target.
• If selected-surface prerequisites are missing, stop without mutation and route that surface to jetson-video-setup. If that skill is not installed, tell the user to install it. Never infer codec or product support from a missing Python import or native build prerequisite.
• Keep the installed native and Python surfaces independent. Query only the requested surface unless the user explicitly selects both.
• Query execution requires this capability skill plus either valid supplied setup evidence or the selected local prerequisites described below. An exact operation check also requires jetson-video-recipe, which owns recipe resolution, and jetson-video-pipeline, which owns authenticated encode-to-independent-decode execution.
• Before a bounded operation check, when setup is installed read its shared video content policy. Query-only work is media-free; only the documented setup fixture is allowed for the capability-smoke exception. Setup is not required solely for this policy: without it, require one exact user-selected path or URL for any other operation, never substitute catalog or synthetic media, and preserve source URL, license, attribution, path, size, and SHA-256.

Resolve this skill from the installed skills root and set CAPABILITY_SKILL to its canonical absolute path. Invoke each owning script directly under isolated Python:

python3 -I "$CAPABILITY_SKILL/scripts/query_native_sample_reports.py" --help
python3 -I "$CAPABILITY_SKILL/scripts/query_encoder_caps.py" --help
python3 -I "$CAPABILITY_SKILL/scripts/query_decoder_caps.py" --help
python3 -I "$CAPABILITY_SKILL/scripts/validate_appenc_av1_ivf.py" --help

If an owning script is missing, stop with dependency_required. A setup artifact is optional; a supplied one is never optional to validate. Do not copy modules from another skill or add a fallback import path.

Compose requested sibling stages

Capability queries and documentation reconciliation require no sibling when the selected SDK prerequisites already exist. Use jetson-video-setup for installation, repair, or one read-only readiness handoff when registered PyNvVideoCodec authority is required; use jetson-video-recipe plus jetson-video-pipeline for an exact requested operation, and jetson-video-benchmark for requested throughput. Check the agent's installed skill catalog before each such stage. If the sibling is present, read its SKILL.md and invoke its documented public entry point; pass artifacts as data and never import sibling code. If it is absent, preserve every completed query result and say, using the actual names: I can run <stage>, but it requires <skill>, which is not installed. Install <skill> and retry this stage. Never require a sibling for an unrequested or optional refinement.

Instructions

1. Classify the request first, before any target probe, capability query, or other workflow step. For a request solely for objective quality metrics, including PSNR or SSIM, state only that this skill does not provide them and that a separately authorized quality workflow is required, then stop. Do not name or recommend an external tool, and do not offer to configure or run the comparison; do not request media, probe, install anything, or launch an operation. For a request solely about Netflix, Widevine, or other DRM-protected streaming-service playback, state only that this skill covers hardware encode/decode of user-supplied non-DRM bitstreams and does not cover, enable, or verify streaming-service or content-DRM playback. Do not claim whether the service will work; do not describe Jetson content-DRM certification; do not recommend or offer to install a browser, a content-DRM module (Widevine, PlayReady), a playback tool, a workaround, or a bypass; do not probe the target or launch an operation. NVDEC decode of supported user-supplied non-DRM bitstreams stays fully in scope for this skill and is never discouraged by this boundary, so you may say so. Then stop. A mixed request that also asks an in-scope codec question is not refused wholesale: answer the in-scope part normally and apply this boundary only to the streaming-service part. An unqualified “DRM” does not by itself mean content protection: on Jetson it commonly means the Linux Direct Rendering Manager (DRM/KMS, /dev/dri, modesetting, display connectors), which this boundary does not cover. Apply this boundary only when the request identifies Netflix, Widevine, PlayReady, streaming-service protection, or otherwise clearly means content Digital Rights Management; if the request says only “DRM” and the context does not resolve which is meant, ask the user which before answering. A local DRM-free MP4 shown on a display is likewise not a content-DRM request, and its codec portion stays in scope. Otherwise handle capability discovery, exact support questions, and interpretation of saved capability evidence. Route package installation to jetson-video-setup, recipe construction to jetson-video-recipe, throughput measurement to jetson-video-benchmark, and multi-stage media work to jetson-video-pipeline. Within a capability request, a genuinely bare “video SDK” phrase with no product qualifier is ambiguous: ask whether the customer means native Video Codec SDK, PyNvVideoCodec, or both, then stop before probing either surface. Report-only intent or “probe the target” does not authorize --runtime both. A capability support/catalog request that names no SDK surface or product phrase uses native-preferred fallback selection, whether it is broad, exact, or a bounded subset. Select native when its route is eligible. Only when native is ineligible, evaluate the PyNvVideoCodec candidate in the authority order defined in step 3; select Py when that candidate is eligible. Do not ask the user to choose merely because this fallback was used. When native is selected, do not evaluate Py; if the response displays that unselected peer, report it as with reason . If neither route is eligible, preserve both typed reasons and provide the applicable setup remediation. Serialize a successful fallback as an explicit or request before applying the shared routing truth table. Carry that resolved surface explicitly into any authorized downstream operation so the operation controller does not reclassify it as . This capability-only unnamed policy is not : only explicit “auto”, “whichever”, “best available”, “choose for me”, or equivalent wording that expressly delegates the SDK choice is genuine ; it is never . Naming Python or PyNvVideoCodec is explicit . Naming Video Codec SDK, , , or is explicit and never falls back.

Read capability-queries.md for exact evidence semantics and surface-selection-contract.md for native, pynvc, auto, and both behavior.

Available Scripts

The four owning scripts are listed in the prerequisite help commands above. Invoke them directly, and read capability-queries.md for route-specific purposes, arguments, and contracts.

Published artifacts

Capability artifacts are optional refinements; authenticated schema-1.2 nvcodec-environment capabilities remain sufficient for sibling workflows. Read capability-queries.md for their exact contracts. Never promote sample/API evidence to support or operation proof.

Troubleshooting

• Preserve capability_reported, operation_verified, operation_failed, raw API unsupported, and unknown as distinct internal states.
• Treat missing query authority, failed registry authentication, absent API fields, nonzero-GPU PyNv queries, and unavailable exact operations as unknown or not_tested with a concrete next action.
• Report a launched exact operation failure as operation_failed, not global product unsupported. A native -ec/-dc report failure remains raw unknown.
• Retry at most once and only after an evidenced condition changes. Use a fresh work directory and output path for the retry.

Limitations

• PyNvVideoCodec 2.1 encoder and decoder capability helpers select GPU 0; nonzero-GPU results remain unknown.
• Capability fields do not measure throughput, quality, latency, camera count, or successful concurrent sessions.
• Objective quality measurement, including PSNR and SSIM, is outside this skill.
• Results apply to the exact target, software versions, GPU, codec tuple, and operation that produced the evidence.