chromeview

[Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io>]

So this is a thing:

https://github.com/pwnall/chromeview

And we know our friends at The Google are going to give us an embedded
ChromeView (someday maybe).

So is this something the Cordova team should be considering?

Can we work w/ our committers from Chromium to create a buildbot that
creates that friendly little binary for us?

Re: chromeview

[Andrew Grieve <ag...@chromium.org>]

16 megs is the number I've heard as well.

Would definitely love for something like this to exist, but it's certainly
not as easy as adding a new built target.

Both Adobe's as well as the github link you sent make use of the chromium
code under android_webview/. My understanding is that any such embedding of
a chrome webview should not include code from android_webview/ since that
code is meant to be tied to future Android versions and has JNI hooks that
make no attempt at being stable nor working on anything but the latest
Android version. A better approach would be to embed the engine via it's
content/ module. However, I don't think anyone has started on such an
effort.

So, in summary, I think this would still be a large effort to get going.
Not unreasonable by any stretch, but more effort than I am able to put in.



On Thu, Jun 6, 2013 at 2:37 PM, Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io> wrote:

> Cool, sounds good. FTR we didn't get 2.3 running but Opera did. While
> we know its possible we are questioning the diminishing value vs the
> effort to get it working (and maintaining).
>
> My ideal is that we get a bot going on Chromium then our create
> tooling can take a flag to use the binary optionally. This would
> require working w/ Chromium infra and I have no idea how that part
> works!
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:15 PM, Michal Mocny <mm...@chromium.org> wrote:
> > Adding to Bradens answer, here are some things I remember discussing:
> >
> > - Chrome/Android teams have significantly harder constraints than cordova
> > would have in terms of backwards compatibility, stability, and API
> > consistency.  Cordova could probably do interesting things if we didn't
> > need to support older apps.  This is interesting.
> > - On the other hand, ignoring the download size, Chrome team really hates
> > forking/other f-wording the web and tries to do that as little as
> possible,
> > and one of the tools to help with that is autoupdate/evergreen browsers.
> >  If we bundle a renderer with a cordova app, when/how does it update?
>  What
> > if there are vulnerabilities discovered? Performance improvements made?
> >  Cordova is kinda a fancy browser, but this would literally mean
> shipping a
> > custom browser with each app.  (cordova devs may argue that the android
> > webview is a bigger pain/other f-word of the web, but alas..)
> >
> > There are many details, and some generally compelling pros/cons to an
> > approach like this.  I think the most interesting point about an
> > application-bundled chromeview is that Adobe folk got it running on 2.3,
> > albeit with unknown stability.  I'de love to get a more compelling answer
> > from Chrome/Android about what the future platform will entail -- perhaps
> > we can have a better answer in a few weeks.
> >
> > -Michal
> >
> >
> > On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:55 PM, Braden Shepherdson <braden@chromium.org
> >wrote:
> >
> >> This is a thing. Unfortunately the person most connected to the state of
> >> Chrome WebViews is Andrew, who is out with a strong case of newborn baby
> >> for a few weeks. We (the Google Cordova team) are chasing some
> tangential
> >> deadlines at the moment and not really ready to set up a buildbot.
> >>
> >> I think the main, and substantial, drawback to the ChromeView approach
> is
> >> that it makes the resulting app huge (upwards of 30MB). Also 4.0+. But
> I'm
> >> just going from what I remember; Andrew would know more.
> >>
> >> Braden
> >>
> >>
> >> On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:42 PM, Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io> wrote:
> >>
> >> > So this is a thing:
> >> >
> >> > https://github.com/pwnall/chromeview
> >> >
> >> > And we know our friends at The Google are going to give us an embedded
> >> > ChromeView (someday maybe).
> >> >
> >> > So is this something the Cordova team should be considering?
> >> >
> >> > Can we work w/ our committers from Chromium to create a buildbot that
> >> > creates that friendly little binary for us?
> >> >
> >>
>

Re: chromeview

[Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io>]

Cool, sounds good. FTR we didn't get 2.3 running but Opera did. While
we know its possible we are questioning the diminishing value vs the
effort to get it working (and maintaining).

My ideal is that we get a bot going on Chromium then our create
tooling can take a flag to use the binary optionally. This would
require working w/ Chromium infra and I have no idea how that part
works!


On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:15 PM, Michal Mocny <mm...@chromium.org> wrote:
> Adding to Bradens answer, here are some things I remember discussing:
>
> - Chrome/Android teams have significantly harder constraints than cordova
> would have in terms of backwards compatibility, stability, and API
> consistency.  Cordova could probably do interesting things if we didn't
> need to support older apps.  This is interesting.
> - On the other hand, ignoring the download size, Chrome team really hates
> forking/other f-wording the web and tries to do that as little as possible,
> and one of the tools to help with that is autoupdate/evergreen browsers.
>  If we bundle a renderer with a cordova app, when/how does it update?  What
> if there are vulnerabilities discovered? Performance improvements made?
>  Cordova is kinda a fancy browser, but this would literally mean shipping a
> custom browser with each app.  (cordova devs may argue that the android
> webview is a bigger pain/other f-word of the web, but alas..)
>
> There are many details, and some generally compelling pros/cons to an
> approach like this.  I think the most interesting point about an
> application-bundled chromeview is that Adobe folk got it running on 2.3,
> albeit with unknown stability.  I'de love to get a more compelling answer
> from Chrome/Android about what the future platform will entail -- perhaps
> we can have a better answer in a few weeks.
>
> -Michal
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:55 PM, Braden Shepherdson <br...@chromium.org>wrote:
>
>> This is a thing. Unfortunately the person most connected to the state of
>> Chrome WebViews is Andrew, who is out with a strong case of newborn baby
>> for a few weeks. We (the Google Cordova team) are chasing some tangential
>> deadlines at the moment and not really ready to set up a buildbot.
>>
>> I think the main, and substantial, drawback to the ChromeView approach is
>> that it makes the resulting app huge (upwards of 30MB). Also 4.0+. But I'm
>> just going from what I remember; Andrew would know more.
>>
>> Braden
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:42 PM, Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io> wrote:
>>
>> > So this is a thing:
>> >
>> > https://github.com/pwnall/chromeview
>> >
>> > And we know our friends at The Google are going to give us an embedded
>> > ChromeView (someday maybe).
>> >
>> > So is this something the Cordova team should be considering?
>> >
>> > Can we work w/ our committers from Chromium to create a buildbot that
>> > creates that friendly little binary for us?
>> >
>>

Re: chromeview

[Michal Mocny <mm...@chromium.org>]

Adding to Bradens answer, here are some things I remember discussing:

- Chrome/Android teams have significantly harder constraints than cordova
would have in terms of backwards compatibility, stability, and API
consistency.  Cordova could probably do interesting things if we didn't
need to support older apps.  This is interesting.
- On the other hand, ignoring the download size, Chrome team really hates
forking/other f-wording the web and tries to do that as little as possible,
and one of the tools to help with that is autoupdate/evergreen browsers.
 If we bundle a renderer with a cordova app, when/how does it update?  What
if there are vulnerabilities discovered? Performance improvements made?
 Cordova is kinda a fancy browser, but this would literally mean shipping a
custom browser with each app.  (cordova devs may argue that the android
webview is a bigger pain/other f-word of the web, but alas..)

There are many details, and some generally compelling pros/cons to an
approach like this.  I think the most interesting point about an
application-bundled chromeview is that Adobe folk got it running on 2.3,
albeit with unknown stability.  I'de love to get a more compelling answer
from Chrome/Android about what the future platform will entail -- perhaps
we can have a better answer in a few weeks.

-Michal


On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:55 PM, Braden Shepherdson <br...@chromium.org>wrote:

> This is a thing. Unfortunately the person most connected to the state of
> Chrome WebViews is Andrew, who is out with a strong case of newborn baby
> for a few weeks. We (the Google Cordova team) are chasing some tangential
> deadlines at the moment and not really ready to set up a buildbot.
>
> I think the main, and substantial, drawback to the ChromeView approach is
> that it makes the resulting app huge (upwards of 30MB). Also 4.0+. But I'm
> just going from what I remember; Andrew would know more.
>
> Braden
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:42 PM, Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io> wrote:
>
> > So this is a thing:
> >
> > https://github.com/pwnall/chromeview
> >
> > And we know our friends at The Google are going to give us an embedded
> > ChromeView (someday maybe).
> >
> > So is this something the Cordova team should be considering?
> >
> > Can we work w/ our committers from Chromium to create a buildbot that
> > creates that friendly little binary for us?
> >
>

Re: chromeview

[Joe Bowser <bo...@gmail.com>]

The last time we tested this approach, it was 16 MB, not 30 MB and
many apps are upwards of that now anyway.  I don't think 30 MB is a
barrier if your app doesn't suck.

Also, who got stuck being substitute Andrew?  I need someone other
than me to tag Android for 2.9.0, since I'll be on vacation the last
week of June.

On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 11:55 AM, Braden Shepherdson <br...@chromium.org> wrote:
> This is a thing. Unfortunately the person most connected to the state of
> Chrome WebViews is Andrew, who is out with a strong case of newborn baby
> for a few weeks. We (the Google Cordova team) are chasing some tangential
> deadlines at the moment and not really ready to set up a buildbot.
>
> I think the main, and substantial, drawback to the ChromeView approach is
> that it makes the resulting app huge (upwards of 30MB). Also 4.0+. But I'm
> just going from what I remember; Andrew would know more.
>
> Braden
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:42 PM, Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io> wrote:
>
>> So this is a thing:
>>
>> https://github.com/pwnall/chromeview
>>
>> And we know our friends at The Google are going to give us an embedded
>> ChromeView (someday maybe).
>>
>> So is this something the Cordova team should be considering?
>>
>> Can we work w/ our committers from Chromium to create a buildbot that
>> creates that friendly little binary for us?
>>

Re: chromeview

[Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io>]

Ya our experiments at Adobe yielded apps around 17mb. (Still beefy for
Hello World!) Also finding that having a 4+ as a req appears to not be
a big deal to the dev community.


On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 1:55 PM, Braden Shepherdson <br...@chromium.org> wrote:
> This is a thing. Unfortunately the person most connected to the state of
> Chrome WebViews is Andrew, who is out with a strong case of newborn baby
> for a few weeks. We (the Google Cordova team) are chasing some tangential
> deadlines at the moment and not really ready to set up a buildbot.
>
> I think the main, and substantial, drawback to the ChromeView approach is
> that it makes the resulting app huge (upwards of 30MB). Also 4.0+. But I'm
> just going from what I remember; Andrew would know more.
>
> Braden
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:42 PM, Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io> wrote:
>
>> So this is a thing:
>>
>> https://github.com/pwnall/chromeview
>>
>> And we know our friends at The Google are going to give us an embedded
>> ChromeView (someday maybe).
>>
>> So is this something the Cordova team should be considering?
>>
>> Can we work w/ our committers from Chromium to create a buildbot that
>> creates that friendly little binary for us?
>>

Re: chromeview

[Braden Shepherdson <br...@chromium.org>]

This is a thing. Unfortunately the person most connected to the state of
Chrome WebViews is Andrew, who is out with a strong case of newborn baby
for a few weeks. We (the Google Cordova team) are chasing some tangential
deadlines at the moment and not really ready to set up a buildbot.

I think the main, and substantial, drawback to the ChromeView approach is
that it makes the resulting app huge (upwards of 30MB). Also 4.0+. But I'm
just going from what I remember; Andrew would know more.

Braden


On Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:42 PM, Brian LeRoux <b...@brian.io> wrote:

> So this is a thing:
>
> https://github.com/pwnall/chromeview
>
> And we know our friends at The Google are going to give us an embedded
> ChromeView (someday maybe).
>
> So is this something the Cordova team should be considering?
>
> Can we work w/ our committers from Chromium to create a buildbot that
> creates that friendly little binary for us?
>