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[androvsky]

Holy mackeral, has anyone tried visiting the web portal for your Plex server via the PS4 or Bone yet? I am out of town so I can't test it.

A couple people have reported Plex video streaming works on the PS4, but not for me. The browser freezes while trying to load the indeed page, and eventually coughs up an error.

 

[Cynn]

Holy mackeral, has anyone tried visiting the web portal for your Plex server via the PS4 or Bone yet? I am out of town so I can't test it.

I use TVmobili. It's a plex/playon/TVersity server program clone. It works fine on the WiiU, PS4 and X1 browsers. I can almost guarantee plex does as well.

 

[satam55]

And from the sound of it Sonys streaming apps. The other apps might be as well.

If that's the case, bodes well for quick ports of existing media/social apps to the PS4 PDM.

This!!! App developers will be able to easily port their apps from other platforms onto the PS4.

 

[JaggedSac]

I use TVmobili. It's a plex/playon/TVersity server program clone. It works fine on the WiiU, PS4 and X1 browsers. I can almost guarantee plex does as well.

Cool, thanks.

 

[AmyS]

Try youtube.com/tv. That works better.

Thanks, I've give that a try.

 

[polyh3dron]

I found this post by Don Olmstead:

https://plus.google.com/+DonOlmstead/posts/Mzy6VEAwHaa



Also check his homepage.

Mock if old.

So basically, all that parts that run like shit. Makes sense.

 

[Chuck Norris]

I don't think anyone in this thread has an idea of what's going on so let me explain:

WebGL is a javascript API for making OpenGL calls. First, this assumes you are using a web programming stack which I don't doubt at all since nearly everyone is moving this direction. However, if you're in the web stack then WebGL does nothing for you in terms of UI, that's all HTML/CSS that's the reason HTML/CSS exist and this is why you'd even bother using the web stack, otherwise you are re-implementing the same thing in an inception manner and killing performance. But not only that, if you rewrote the entire UI layer in WebGL why not just make it in plain old OpenGL because you aren't using the web stack at all? It doesn't make any sense to do it like this.

My guess is he means that the engine they picked (most likely webkit) supports WebGL and this is used in some places for special effects.

Thanks for simplifying it so much

 

[satam55]

It looks like Netflix on PS4 will definitely have voice commands in the future:

With the new UI, all of this changes. Netflix decided to ditch Webkit as a rendering engine and instead build a native platform for the most common connected device chipsets out there, circumventing the various smart TV SDKs in the process. The company even decided to develop its own voice recognition technology to make voice input consistent across platforms, and not have the Xbox implementation differ from implementations on smart TVs that come with support for voice input.

More at: http://gigaom.com/2013/11/12/netflix-ditches-webkit-to-roll-out-slick-new-ui-for-smart-tvs-roku-boxes-and-game-consoles/

 

[hodayathink]

I wonder when Youtube will work in the web browser, almost all videos say the required plugin is missing.

Sounds like it treats the PS4 browser as a normal desktop browser and tries to load Flash instead of using HTML5. The TV version of YouTube should work, and switching to the HTML5 version should work as well.

 

[DirgeExtinction]

I wonder when Youtube will work in the web browser, almost all videos say the required plugin is missing.

Have you tried going to http://www.youtube.com/html5 and turning that on?

 

[PetriP-TNT]

Jeffy_Rigby redeemed

 

[atbigelow]

The fact that all three (now) current gen consoles use HTML5 for apps is very smart and efficient. It lets them quickly update and expand their features, fix bugs, and so on.

However, one thing that sucks is that since these things are cloud hosted, any hiccup with either their servers or your internet shoots performance in the foot. I wish there was a good way to keep half the app saved locally (for things like persistent UI and such) and just retrieve data as needed.

Also to be more on topic, no way are they using WebGL for the entirety of the UI elements.

 

[AmyS]

Have you tried going to http://www.youtube.com/html5 and turning that on?

Okay I just tried that, went to youtube.com/html5, selected it,

Then went back to youtube.com and it seems to help, although I only tested it out on a few videos.

 

[satam55]

The fact that all three (now) current gen consoles use HTML5 for apps is very smart and efficient. It lets them quickly update and expand their features, fix bugs, and so on.

However, one thing that sucks is that since these things are cloud hosted, any hiccup with either their servers or your internet shoots performance in the foot. I wish there was a good way to keep half the app saved locally (for things like persistent UI and such) and just retrieve data as needed.

Also to be more on topic, no way are they using WebGL for the entirety of the UI elements.

Yeah, he explained that on his follow-up post:

Thanks for the great response everyone! Sony embracing web technologies such as #webgl was what brought me to work here, and I'm really excited to talk about the details of our application. I think our team here has done an amazing job with the user experience.

I wanted to address some comments and clarify what is actually running WebGL with some development screen grabs. Each is highlighted accordingly. PS4 store is done completely in WebGL so I didn't attach anything related to that.

WebKit or Blink? We're a WebKit shop currently as people figured out from the PS4 license. The Blink/WebKit split happened after we were deep in development. My personal preference is Blink but that's not my decision to make.

UI framework is in house tech. I handled the layer below that it uses for its rendering which is all WebGL. Will be talking more about everything at that level during my talk at +SFHTML5.

What's New View

What's New view with WebGL highlighted

Live details view

Live Details view with WebGL highlighted

https://plus.google.com/+DonOlmstead/posts/Mzy6VEAwHaa

 

[atbigelow]

Yeah, he explained that on his follow-up post:

Wow, that's pretty much the entirety of those views. I wonder why they decided to do so much in pure WebGL? Not that using GL-based APIs is bad, since the PS has used it for a decade now. But you usually use WebKit when you want the rapid dev time of web apps; not to ignore all that and use lower-level GL calls.

I was planning on watching his talk after the fact, so hopefully he explains the reasons.

EDIT: Looks like in the comments for his newer post he explained slightly (obviously saving details for his talk). Seems a big reason for it was deployment. Makes sense.

 

[Truespeed]

So my initial reaction is that they'll be able to iterate the UI more rapidly since it's essentially an HTML5 interface with WebGL bindings as opposed to custom UI application.

 

[Infinite Xero]

Try youtube.com/tv. That works better.

Thanks. Now I can watch Youtube walkthroughs with a quick switch on PS4 instead of using my computer.

 

[NemesisPrime]

I found this post by Don Olmstead:

https://plus.google.com/+DonOlmstead/posts/Mzy6VEAwHaa



Also check his homepage.

Mock if old.

Mock if true more like it. What a weird decision.

 

[Barkley's Justice]

It's built on web standards, which makes it portable. It could conceivably work across platforms. WebGL gives the UI GPU acceleration, as opposed to just doing it in javascript/css.

 

[mckmas8808]

Try youtube.com/tv. That works better.

Does it work for Gamespot and IGN videos on youtube?

 

[Somnid]

It's built on web standards, which makes it portable. It could conceivably work across platforms. WebGL gives the UI GPU acceleration, as opposed to just doing it in javascript/css.

Not true, unless their implementation is shit. Most common CSS effects and transforms are GPU accelerated on most platforms (as is canvas which is more geared toward 2D custom drawing). Rewriting that in javascript would undoubtedly be a performance hit.

 

[jeff_rigby]

Wow, that's pretty much the entirety of those views. I wonder why they decided to do so much in pure WebGL? Not that using GL-based APIs is bad, since the PS has used it for a decade now. But you usually use WebKit when you want the rapid dev time of web apps; not to ignore all that and use lower-level GL calls.

I was planning on watching his talk after the fact, so hopefully he explains the reasons.

EDIT: Looks like in the comments for his newer post he explained slightly (obviously saving details for his talk). Seems a big reason for it was deployment. Makes sense.

Optimizing WebGL Applications with Don Olmstead PS4

It's because of the Playstation store:
Software stacks below

1) PS3 Store evolved from XML using OpenVG and Rest and SOAP.
2) Then the below software stack.

Remember the PS3 didn't get a webkit browser till late in life (Feb 2012 PS3 4.10). Trilithium APIs using a Javascript VM was in place before webkit in the PS3 (according to the UI developer.they had Trilithium in 2009) Javascript engine was disclosed in 2010 and Hulu was using Trilithium shortly after.


PS3

Playstation Store
UI Framework GUI
Trilithium APIs using a 2D Javascript VM
Phyre Engine
PS LibGCM (speculation)

PS3 now has a GPU accelerated webkit with CairoGL WebGL/OpenGL support. It's not being used in the PS3 for the store like the PS4 below. Coming or are there performance issues.

PS4

Playstation Store
UI Framework
Trilithium created with WebGL
Webkit with CairoGL
OpenGL (speculation)