Can I make ffmpeg stop if integrity check encounters an error?

Question

Is there a way to stop ffmpeg from processing if an error was encountered? I'm using ffmpeg to check video integrity by using:

ffmpeg -v error -i file.avi -f null - 2>error.log

However, I'd like to expand on it to stop the process as soon as an error is identified.

Answer 1

I've already wondered about this myself, and ffmpeg doesn't provide an easy way to do that. Based on the feedback I got on the FFmpeg mailing list, you can use the global option

-err_detect explode

This option doesn't appear to work in all cases though. See ffmpeg -h full for the option list:

-err_detect        <flags>      .D.... set error detection flags

The values are as follows:

Possible values:

• crccheck: verify embedded CRCs

• bitstream: detect bitstream specification deviations

• buffer: detect improper bitstream length

• explode: abort decoding on minor error detection

• ignore_err: ignore decoding errors, and continue decoding. This is useful if you want to analyze the content of a video and thus want everything to be decoded no matter what. This option will not result in a video that is pleasing to watch in case of errors.

• careful: consider things that violate the spec and have not been seen in the wild as errors

• compliant: consider all spec non compliancies as errors

• aggressive: consider things that a sane encoder should not do as an error

Answer 2

In an option:

-xerror 

The command line option is documented as doing exactly what you want.

Add the option and ffmpeg will exit on a stream error (also setting exit value to 1) from:

ffmpeg -h full | grep xerror .... -xerror error exit on error