Yahoo! Widget Engine TV Widgets Release Notes

Abstract

Use of this document is subject to the Yahoo! TV Widget Developer Terms of Use license, located at http://info.yahoo.com/legal/us/yahoo/tvwidget/tvwidget-4251.html.

This document provides the release notes for the latest version of the Yahoo! Widget Engine TV Widgets Widget Development Kit (YWE-WDK). For the latest information on TV Widgets, see the Yahoo! Connected TV Forums.

For more information please review the documentation available on the Yahoo! Developer Network.

YWE-WDK v1.2

Release Date: January 2011

Release Notes for YWE-WDK v1.2

  1. This YWE-WDK comes with its own Ubuntu Virtual Machine (VM), with support for both VMware and VirtualBox on PCs and Macs. This VM will help prevent many of the compatibility issues experienced by some developers with the previous version of the YWE-WDK. Detailed instructions for installing this YWE-WDK update are on the YDN site located at http://developer.yahoo.com/connectedtv/installguide/index.html, including links to download both the Ubuntu VM and the YWE-WDK package.
  2. Once you have installed VMware or VirtualBox, perform all system updates/upgrades before running the Ubuntu 10.04 VM provided by Yahoo!. After opening and running the provided VM, do not attempt to update/upgrade VMware or VirtualBox again as it may change YWE-WDK dependencies. Yahoo! has optimized and tested the YWE-WDK to run in this specific configuration and does not guarantee compatibility if any software updates are made to the VM, Ubuntu, or if other versions are used. This YWE-WDK is designed to run on top of a stripped-down version of Ubuntu 10.04 LTS VM which has been extensively tested by Yahoo! on the following versions of VMware and VirtualBox:
    • Mac OS 10.6.4
      • VMware Fusion 3.1
      • Virtual Box 3.2.8
    • Windows 7
      • VMware Player 3.1.1
      • VMware Workstation 7.1
      • Virtual Box 3.2.8

    You should not attempt to update the development environment. System updates for this VM have been disabled to prevent support issues with Ubuntu 10.04 configurations that have not been tested by Yahoo! Connected TV.

  3. If you are using VirtualBox you should browse to and open the ubuntu_10.04_ctv.vmdk file directly. If you are using VirtualBox and have previously installed VMware Fusion, you need to right-click on the package folder and select Show Package Contents and then move the .vmdk file to a new location before use.
  4. This YWE-WDK is based on the latest version 5.6 of the Yahoo! Widget Engine currently deployed in the field by TV OEMs. This new version of the widget engine no longer supports synchronous calls. TV Widgets currently using synchronous calls will show an error unless they are modified to remove the synchronous calls.
  5. A new OEM configuration is available for Toshiba TVs, in addition to the previously supported Samsung, LG, and Vizio configurations.
  6. As new versions of the KONtx Framework and Container are released for each OEM, they will be pushed to this YWE-WDK through the Gallery (without requiring a new YWE-WDK download and installation).
  7. Resolving the error: You do not have the proper files in your $HOME/TVWidgets/Konfabulator-XXX/TV directory.

    In this version of the YWE-WDK, essential scripts are executed when you exit from the Simulator after your first run, and again after updates occur. If you exit the Simulator incorrectly, the exit scripts do not execute, and you will not be able to restart the Simulator. These scripts copy several files into the $HOME/TVWidgets/Konfabulator-XXX/TV directory and may take several seconds to run.

    Exiting the Yahoo! TV Simulator Properly

    You must use the following method to exit the Yahoo! TV Simulator.

    a. First, be sure that the Yahoo! TV Simulator window has focus (and not the Simulator Console's Terminal window).

    b. Press the ESC key on your computer keyboard, or click on the standard close button (x) in the Yahoo! TV Simulator's title bar, as shown in the upper left corner of the window below:

    c. When the exit script has completed successfully, a dialog box displays: Simulator has exited. Press OK to close Terminal, as seen below:

    d. Finally, click the OK button in the dialog box to close the Simulator Console's Terminal window.

    Clearing the Improper Exit Error

    If you exit the Simulator Console's Terminal window without first properly closing the Yahoo! TV Simulator window, you may see the following error message each time you attempt to restart the Simulator:

    To clear the error above and restart the Simulator, follow these steps:

    a. Delete the directory that corresponds to the Simulator displaying the error.

    rm -rf $HOME/TVWidgets/Konfabulator-XXX

    b. Start the Simulator using the corresponding TV Widgets→XXX→XXX Simulator menu item.

    c. Wait for the Simulator to completely load, and for all updates to finish, which may take up to 45 seconds.

    d. Make sure the Yahoo! TV Simulator window has focus, and press the ESC key on your keyboard, or click on the standard close button (x) in the title bar.

    e. The exit script runs, and after several seconds, a dialog box with the following text appears: Simulator has exited. Press OK to close Terminal.

    f. Press the OK button in the dialog box to close the Simulator Console's Terminal window.

    g.You can now start the Simulator without the recurring error.

    h. If you continue to see the error, review the files in the Simulator's TV directory. If you do not see the files listed below, repeat this process from the first step above: "a. Delete the directory...". Type these commands to review the files:

    cd $HOME/TVWidgets/Konfabulator-XXX/TV
    find .

    Check for the following files:

  8. The media player used in this YWE-WDK has changed, and is now based on OpenGL for better compatibility with a wider range of host development environments. The media player is integrated with the widget engine in a way that is similar to the way OEMs integrate the media player on the TV. One side effect of this change is that video playback performance within the VM will often be worse than in the WDK 1.0 release, especially when playing HD streams. The Simulator is not intended to reproduce the performance on the TV, but to provide a development environment for writing and debugging applications. In a VM environment, video playback is supported through GStreamer and is CPU intensive. For the best performance, a dual core processor is required. By default, VMware runs in dual-processor mode. If you are using VirtualBox you need to manually switch the settings to dual-processor mode. If your VM is using all available processors and performance is still a problem, setting the value of video_skip_frames to 8 improves CPU performance but degrades video playback by playing only 1 out of 9 frames. If CPU performance is not an issue, this value can be decreased for smoother video playback.

    See the section Edit the Simulator Settings to learn more about these environment variables.

  9. On Windows 7 systems, over slow networks, the Simulator may respond to key events extremely slowly during HD video playback. While the Simulator is not responsive, the following Simulator Console commands continue to work:

  10. If a blank screen is displayed in the Simulator while playing video, check the viewport bounds for proper values. If the viewport bounds have not been explicitly set, be sure to set them to the default viewport bounds. The media player does not set these default values upon initialization. When it becomes available, KONtx Framework v1.3.39+ sets the default viewport bounds for fullscreen views.

    Use the method getDefaultViewportBounds() to get a viewport bounds object for the device. The current default viewport bounds for all device partners have the (x,y) position at (0,0) and set the width and height of the viewport to 1920 x 1080. These values are subject to change as new device platforms are added. Always check the viewport bounds for proper values.

    To set the default viewport configuration for the media player, use the following call in your updateView() method before playing video as shown in the MediaPlayerSample widget in $HOME/TVWidgets/Konfabulator-Latest/TV/Widgets:

    The default viewport will stretch 4:3 content during playback on some devices. The video playback on the Simulator is not intended to be an indicator of the video playback on the Connected TV device. If you want to configure the aspect ratio of video playback for 4:3 content without stretching you can set the viewport properties as follows:

Table of Contents