This document records all notable changes made to Cobalt since the last release.
Improvements and Bug Fixes
Fix bug where Cobalt would not refresh the layout when the textContent property of a DOM TextNode is modified.
Add support for decoding JPEG images as multi-plane YUV
JPEG images are decoded into RGBA in previous versions of Cobalt. The native format of most JPEG images is YV12, which takes only 3/8 of memory compare to RGBA. Now JPEG images are decoded into multi-plane YUV images on platforms with “rasterizer_type” set to “direct-gles”. As a result, when decoding to multi-plane image is enabled, image cache size set by AutoMem will be reduced by half due to the more compact nature of the YUV image format versus RGB. This feature can also be enabled/disabled explicitly by passing command line parameter “allow_image_decoding_to_multi_plane” to Cobalt with value “true” or “false”.
Cobalt code assumes that no errors are generated for unused parameters
There now exists Cobalt code where input parameters may be unused, and it is expected that toolchains will not generate errors in these cases. You may need to adjust your Starboard configuration so that your compiler no longer emits this error, e.g. build with the -Wno-unused-parameter command line flag in GCC. UNREFERENCED_PARAMETER has been removed, but SB_UNREFERENCED_PARAMETER will continue to be supported.
MediaSession actions and action details have changed to match the spec
MediaSession now uses the newly specified seekto action instead of the Cobalt 19 seek action, which has been removed. Also added skipad and stop to the recognized actions, but the web app may not handle them yet. The MediaSessionClient now uses a generated POD class for the IDL MediaSessionActionDetails dictionary rather than an inner Data class when invoking actions. (see: https://wicg.github.io/mediasession)
MediaSession supports setPositionState() function
MediaSession now supports the newly specified setPositionState() function. MediaSessionClient now provides an immutable MediaSessionState object that may be copied and queried on any thread to get a coherent view of attributes set by the the web app on the MediaSession.
Add support for V8 JavaScript Engine
Cobalt now supports V8 (in addition to SpiderMonkey) as JavaScript engines. V8 can be enabled by setting the gyp variable ‘javascript_engine’ to ‘v8’, and additionally setting the gyp variable ‘cobalt_enable_jit’ to 1. These variables should be set from your gyp_configuration.py Python file (and not for example your gyp_configuration.gypi file).
Add support for animated WebP images with transparency
This was not originally supported by Cobalt, and any prior use of animated WebP with transparency would have resulted in visual artifacts.
Storage format changed from sqlite3 to protobuf
Cobalt's internal representation for persistent storage of cookies and local storage entries changed from sqlite3 to protobuf. The header of the SbStorageRecord blob was updated from SAV0 to SAV1 and all the data will be migrated to the new format the next time Cobalt is launched. The schema is available at cobalt/storage/store/storage.proto.
IPv4 Preference
Cobalt is now configured to prefer an IPv4 address to IPv6 addresses when choosing an initial server address from DNS responses. That is, if a DNS response contains both IPv4 addresses and IPv6 addresses, Cobalt will now explicitly attempt to connect an IPv4 address before possibly moving onto IPv6 on connect failures. Unfortunately, we've discovered common scenarios where IPv6 addresses were listed in DNS responses but intervening network configurations prevented IPv6 use after connect time. This caused the previous implementation to appear as if no network was available.
Enable voice interactions
A subset of WebRTC APIs has been added. getUserMedia can be used to get audio input stream from the microphone. The media stream can then be connected to MediaRecorder to receive the audio data stored as Blob objects which can later be sent over the network. This allows web apps to implement voice-enabled features without relying on the platform's capability to perform speech recognition.
Bison 3 required
Support for compiling with version 2.x of the GNU bison parser generator has been removed. Please update to version 3.x.
Improvements and Bug Fixes
Fix pointer/mouse events not being dispatched to JavaScript in the same order that they are generated by Starboard, relative to other input events like key presses.
Fix issue with CSS media queries not assigning correct rule indices. An issue was discovered and fixed where CSS rules defined within @media rules would be assigned a CSS rule index relative to their position within the nested @media rule rather than being assigned an index relative to their position within the parent CSS file. As a result, rules may have been assigned incorrect precedence during CSS rule matching.
Fix issue where the style attribute would not appear in the string output of calls to element.outerHTML.
Rebase libwebp to version 1.0.0
Update the version of libwebp used by Cobalt from 0.3.1 to 1.0.0. The new version brings with it performance improvements and bug fixes.
Move javascript_engine and cobalt_enable_jit build variables
Move gyp variables javascript_engine and cobalt_enable_jit, which were previously defined in cobalt_configuration.gypi, to $PLATFORM/gyp_configuration.py. This was done in order to work around bindings gyp files' complex usage of gyp variables, which prevented us from having a default JavaScript engine at the gyp variable level. Now, platforms will by default use the JavaScript engine selected by starboard/build/platform_configuration.py, and can override it by providing a different one in their GetVariables implementation. See the linux-x64x11-mozjs platform for an override example.
IMPORTANT: While existing gyp files that define javascript_engine and cobalt_enable_jit may continue to work by chance, it is strongly preferred to move all declarations of these variables to python instead.
Move test data
Static test data is now copied to content/data/test instead of content/dir_source_root. Tests looking for the path to this data should use BasePathKey::DIR_TEST_DATA instead of BasePathKey::DIR_SOURCE_ROOT. Tests in Starboard can find the static data in the test/ subdirectory of kSbSystemPathContentDirectory.
Add support for cobalt_media_buffer_max_capacity
Allow bounding the max capacity allocated by decoder buffers, by setting the gypi variables cobalt_media_buffer_max_capacity_1080p and cobalt_media_buffer_max_capacity_4k. 1080p applies to all resolutions 1080p and below. Those values default to 0, which imposes no bounds. If non-zero, each capacity must be greater than or equal to the sum of the video budget and non video budget for that resolution (see cobalt_media_buffer_video_buffer_1080p, cobalt_media_buffer_non_video_budget, etc.), and the max capacities must be greater than or equal to the corresponding initial capacities: cobalt_media_buffer_initial_capacity_1080p and cobalt_media_buffer_initial_capacity_4k.
Fix issue with CSS animations not working with the ‘outline’ property
There was a bug in previous versions that resulted in incorrect behavior when applying a CSS animation or CSS transition to the ‘outline’ property. This is fixed now.
Change default minimum frame time to 16.0ms instead of 16.4ms.
In case a platform can only wait on millisecond resolution, we would prefer that it wait 16ms instead of 17ms, so we round this down. Many platforms will pace themselves to 16.6ms regardless.
Make new rasterizer type “direct-gles” default
This is an optimized OpenGLES 2.0 rasterizer that provides a fast path for rendering most of the skia primitives that Cobalt uses. While it was available since Version 11, it is now polished and set as the default rasterizer.
Added support for the fetch and streams Web APIs
A subset of ReadableStream and Fetch Web APIs have been implemented. Fetch may be used to get progressive results via a ReadableStream, or the full result can be accessed as text, from the Response class.
HTMLMediaElement::loop is supported
Now the video plays in a loop if the loop attribute of the video element is set.
Add support for MediaDevices.enumerateDevices()
It is now possible to enumerate microphone devices from JavaScript via a call to navigator.mediaDevices.enumerateDevices(). This returns a promise of an array of MediaDeviceInfo objects, each partially implemented to have valid label and kind attributes.
Improvements and Bug Fixes
Add support for document.hasFocus()
While support for firing blur and focus events was implemented, querying the current state via document.hasFocus() was not implemented until now.
Implemented Same Origin Policy and removed navigation whitelist
Add support for touchpad not associated with a pointer
This adds support for input of type kSbInputDeviceTypeTouchPad for touchpads not associated with a pointer.
Splash Screen Customization
The Cobalt splash screen is customizable. Documents may use a link element with attribute rel=“splashscreen” to reference the splash screen which will be cached if local cache is implemented on the platform. Additionally fallbacks may be specified via command line parmeter or gypi variable. For more information, see doc/splash_screen.md.
Introduce C++11
C++11 is now used within Cobalt code, and so Cobalt must be compiled using C++11 toolchains.
Update SpiderMonkey from version 24 to 45; support ECMAScript 6
The Mozilla SpiderMonkey JavaScript engine is rebased up to version 45, and thus ECMAScript 6 is now supported by Cobalt. You will need to modify your gyp_configuration.gypi file to set 'javascript_engine': 'mozjs-45' to enable this.
Fetch/Stream API
Cobalt now supports the Fetch/Stream API.
On-device Speech-to-Text support
Support for utilizing the new Starboard speech recognizer interface in order to allow for on-device speech-to-text support is now added. The Starboard interface is defined in starboard/speech_recognizer.h.
Mouse pointer support
Cobalt now supports pointer events and will respond to Starboard kSbInputEventTypeMove events. These will be passed into the WebModule to be processed by JavaScript.
Custom Web Extension Support
Cobalt now allows platforms to inject a custom namespace property into the JavaScript global window object visible to the web apps. This allows for custom web apps to interface with custom C++ code written outside of Cobalt common code. See doc/webapi_extension.md for more details.
Playback Rate
Cobalt now supports adjusting the video playback rate.
AutoMem - Memory Configuration
AutoMem has been added which assists developers in tuning the memory settings of the Cobalt app. On startup, memory settings are now printed for all builds except gold. Memory settings can be altered via the command line, build files and in some instances the Starboard API. For more information, see cobalt/doc/memory_tuning.md.
Page Visibility API Support
Cobalt now supports the page visibility API, and will signal visibility and focus changes to the web app as the process transitions between Starboard lifecycle states. See the new Application Lifecycle Integration document for more details.
Opus Support
Added support for providing Opus audio-specific config to Starboard. Requires Starboard 6.
Linux build now supports 360 video
The Linux build linux-x64x11 now supports 360 video, and can be used as a reference implementation.
Stop the application if not retrying after a connection error
A positive response from kSbSystemPlatformErrorTypeConnectionError now indicates that Cobalt should retry the failed request. Any other response now causes Cobalt to call SbSystemRequestStop.
Frame rate counter
A frame rate counter is now made accessible. It actually displays frame times, the inverse of frame rate. In this case, 16.6ms corresponds to 60fps. It is accessible both as an overlay on the display by the command line option, “--fps_overlay”. The data can also be printed to stdout with the command line option “--fps_stdout”. The frame rate statistics will be updated each time an animation ends, or after 60 frames have been processed. Both command line flags are available in Gold builds.
Add support for rendering kSbDecodeTargetFormat1PlaneUYVY (YUV 422)
Decode targets with the format kSbDecodeTargetFormat1PlaneUYVY will now be rendered by Cobalt. This will allow decoders that produce YUV 422 UYVY video frames to now efficiently support 360 video.
Preload Support
Support for preloading an application with no graphics resources. See the new Application Lifecycle Integration guide for more details.
Improvements and Bug Fixes
GetClientRects() calculations.display: none on an element.offset_left and similar properties are no longer cause many expensive re-layouts to query.