QtWebEngine/WorkShop 2024 October

When: 2024-10-10 - 2024-10-11

See QtWebEngine/Features for the last two workshops

Topics

• WebEngine Use Cases
• Qt 6.9 planning
  • Windows ARM support
    • QtPDF was easy, but WebEngine is more complicated
    • Kaloyan looking into it
    • One major issue is GAS assembly.
      • ffmpeg, boringssl, and dav1d
      • For boringssl and dav1d we can disable assembly optimizations.
      • We have a perl script that converts GAS to NASM that could make us build on MSVC
  • Extension API.
    • Basic API: Load manifest plus path.
    • Addons are enabling more Chromium extensions APIs (we currently only provide a limited amount).
      • One complicated API that is widely used is the tabs API, which is not that simple to integrate
    • PWA API
      • Has some database of installed apps
  • D3D12 support
    • Even doable? Does it need Dawn?
    • We probably need Dawn graphics integration anyway
  • ANGLE use with WGL/GLX/EGL
    • Peter is working on it
    • WGL removal patch up for review
    • GLX/EGL is integrated in 5.9, but not on by default.
  • New setting for touch-event handling API, to avoid websites detecting desktops with touch screens as mobile.
  • High-contrast theme passing on Windows
  • Printing header and footers.
  • Async download requests
  • Profile builder API
    • Deprecation of old API might be complicated when we copy to old Qt versions.
  • Wrap up frame-based API.
  • Finished (first) rendering signal.
  • Update to Chromium 128, and 130
• Use cases
  • SVG renderer
  • OAuth
  • Stacking of native views (webview)
• Qt WebView speculation
  • WebView2 Windows backend
  • C++ API, QtWidgets, or QtGui QWindow?
• Version independence
  • We are currently just pretending to be qtbase version
  • Should we continue to support 6.5 in 6.9?

Agenda

Thursday

• Agenda discussion
  • Scope of webengine
    • Cypersecurity resilient act
    • WebView
  • Talk of what we want to do
• Feature Brainstorm
  • QWebEngineWindow
  • Pretend to be patch level version in agent string?
  • QWebEngineUrlResponseInterceptor
  • WebData
  • Autofill API/ Password manager integration
  • More extensions API
  • Payment API
  • Removing Machine Learning/WebNN crap
  • Subresource loading status.
  • Minimal build, binary size reduction.
    • Investigate existing if still meaningful, and new options that are.
  • Reinitialization with QApplications.
  • Early shutdown of WebEngine
  • Single executable (in main binary helper process)
    • Needed for moving networking out of main process on some platforms.
  • Static builds (licensing, and needs above)
  • Dawn rendering
  • Paint to QPainter/image, doesnt have to be live
• Support brainstop
  • Patch reduction
    • Code changing the same code, should ideally be one commit, to not deal with merge issues multiple times.
  • Upstreaming
    • Peter presented
  • Rebasing
    • Allan and Michal can do early stage, the goal is to have three people that can do the early stage.
      • We might need to have somebody working on rebasing almost always
    • First stage is that it builds on most platforms, and runs almost all tests without crashing (but possibly failing)
    • Everybody helps after first stage is done.
    • Suggested [] notation of chromium patches. We have FIXUP, [Revert], [Backport], we can add compiler or platform or qt module. Consider mixed/lost backport commits([Persistent Backport]?).
    • We should consider doing a team review of all patches.
• Backlog grooming
  • We went through the 50 oldest and 20 newest bugs
• Follow-up discussion
  • We should try to have more reliable tests
  • SCCache should be investigated
    • Can we preserve WebEngine cache better
    • Can we enable SCCache on Windows

Friday

• Chromium Patch workshop
  • We went through the 94 first patches in 126-based
• Documentation workshop
  • Motivation in qtwebengine landing pages
  • Add better short description of WebEngine
  • Overview
    • Add references to WebView for unsupported platforms
    • Update graphics overview for webenginequick
    • WebEngine overview is bad.
    • What a QWebEngineScript should look like and what it can do should be on the class page.
    • References to examples
    • Mention user-certificates with ssl certificates
    • High DPI being covered explicit is outdated
    • Related modules should cover qt pdf and not try to link to qtwebkit
  • Features
    • Link to external documenation for proprietary codecs.
    • Last sentence on codecs is bad
    • Reprioritize integrated devtools over remote debugging
    • More on custom schemes. For instance with OAuth.
      • Also mention the scheme registration
    • Hardware acceleration section is outdated
    • HTML5 DRM could say more explicitly we do not ship it.
    • Remove mentioning of features added before Qt 6.2
    • WebChannel out of webSockets doc, and maybe remove websocket doc.
    • Mention HTTP/3
    • Native dialogs. Quick Controls 1 no longer exists. Form validation message no longer work on Qt6.
    • And maybe the native dialogs often arent native
    • Pdf file viewing should not mention pluginenabled setting.
    • Lifecycle should probably mention very early it does nothing by default.
    • Process module is not a feature, move to overview. Check if custom settings are valid and up to date.
    • Spellchecking should mention Win support, after Kaloyan has tested it. Which he says he will..
    • AuthUX feature
    • Permissions Feature
    • Frame API features
    • Push notifications
  • Platform notes,
    • nodejs is should be higher than 14
    • Linux gcc min is 10 AFAIK.
    • Linux libgbm needed
    • Linux Wayland config should be mentioned
    • Windows, clang-cl 19 is needed
    • Check macOS support. Maybe just link to QT platform support.
    • Earlier versions should update versions, and have cmake example instead of qmake.
    • Mac app store compat. Check and remove if ignored now.
    • Check mac airplay section
    • Macos QSurfaceFormat paragraph update
    • Update sandbox section (moss checked this earlier)
    • command line arguments need to repeat --webEngineArgs everywhere
    • Accessibility is outdated now.
    • Fullscreen windows opengl is outdated, remove
    • Move window application manifest to deploy
  • Debugging and profile
    • Console logging should tell how to get console logging on Windows.
    • Developer tools is repeated from features/overview, deduplicate emphasise internel views.
    • --enable-features=NetworkServiceInProcess is default now. Maybe document the reverse
  • Deploying
    • Target platforms probably not needed here
    • Some standard parts are from Qt deploying can be removed, or just referenced.
    • devtool resources are not just for remote debugging
    • Manifest info from Windows moved here.
  • Module evolution could mention APIs deprecated or improved in Qt 6.x
  • Examples
    • Maybe merge module examples pages.
    • Running repeats. Do we want it?
    • Recipe.
      • Link to scripting and webchannel features
    • There is a problem with wrapping of examples documentation.
    • Cookie browser, is very minimal.
    • Maps add link to geolocation feature
    • Printme could be expanded to frame api.
    • Simplebrowser link to deploying for macOS.
    • Ditto, do that for windows too.
    • Videoplayer, link to proprietary codec issue.
  • QML docu
    • ShareOpenGL attribute is not needed. Initialize will do that where necessary
• Feature and Support follow-up
• Backlog grooming
• Key-customers, and major users
• Conclusion
  • Roadmap

Summary

What to do better next time?