💡Feature Request: Provide Alternative APK Using VLC Instead of Media3

Describe your suggested feature

First of all, thank you for the awesome work on Cloudstream. I would like to suggest releasing a second APK (optional build) that uses the VLC player library instead of the default androidx.media3 (ExoPlayer). This would allow users to choose between the two depending on their needs and device compatibility.

Why this is useful:

Media3 (ExoPlayer) is lightweight and integrates well with the Android ecosystem but may have limitations with certain codecs or streaming formats.

VLC has wider codec support, better handling of some stream types, and includes features like subtitle rendering and hardware/software decoding options.

Suggested Approach:

Keep the current APK using androidx.media3 as the default.

Release an optional secondary APK (e.g., cloudstream-vlc.apk) which includes VLC as the playback engine.

Other details

Additional Notes:

This approach gives users flexibility without impacting the main app release. VLC already has an Android library that could be used with some conditional logic or flavor-based builds.

Thanks for considering this!

Acknowledgements

• My suggestion is NOT about adding a new provider
• I have searched the existing issues and this is a new ticket, NOT a duplicate or related to another open issue.

No files or tests are named. Start by reviewing the Android build configuration and the current Media3 playback integration, then assess how a flavor-based build could include the VLC Android library. Done means a separately releasable VLC APK exists without changing the default Media3 APK.