Google Claims ChromeCast Local Streaming Only Broken Because of SDK Changes 82
sfcrazy writes "You may be familiar with the story that a ChromeCast update disabled the playback of local content, but Google has confirmed that it will allow every kind of content. Google Statement: 'We're excited to bring more content to Chromecast and would like to support all types of apps, including those for local content. It's still early days for the Google Cast SDK, which we just released in developer preview for early development and testing only. We expect that the SDK will continue to change before we launch out of developer preview, and want to provide a great experience for users and developers before making the SDK and additional apps more broadly available.' So no need to fear!"
Most unsurprising explanation is the most likely (Score:5, Insightful)
Much as everyone on here loved to crow about how Google were being evil and locking the device down, isn't this the far more likely reason? An undocumented API has changed. Now can we stop overreacting? Locking down this device isn't really their style.
Re: Most unsurprising explanation is the most like (Score:2, Insightful)
I suspected it was some mistake, but I still think they're evil.
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I suspected it was some mistake, but I still think they're evil.
Well, Edward Snowden pretty much confirmed that. [cryptome.org]
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I suspected it was some mistake, but I still think they're evil.
Well indeed, but let's atleast get our reasons straight...
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"Don't be perceived as evil"
Thanks Machiavelli.
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Re:Most unsurprising explanation is the most likel (Score:5, Insightful)
Much as everyone on here loved to crow about how Google were being evil and locking the device down, isn't this the far more likely reason? An undocumented API has changed. Now can we stop overreacting? Locking down this device isn't really their style.
No, their style will be to cancel the device/services with some warning and litle explanation.
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Latitue
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Latitue
Latitude isn't cancelled, it's just moving into Google+. Granted that in the short term it's lost some functionality, but I'm sure it'll be back.
Re:Most unsurprising explanation is the most likel (Score:5, Informative)
Much as everyone on here loved to crow about how Google were being evil and locking the device down, isn't this the far more likely reason? An undocumented API has changed. Now can we stop overreacting? Locking down this device isn't really their style.
No, their style will be to cancel the device/services with some warning and litle explanation.
Cancel the system that's bringing YouTube (and its ads) into the living room? Seems very unlikely. In general, Google only discontinues services that aren't very successful (no, Reader wasn't very widely used, in spite of the heat generated by its fans). Successful services that are generating revenue are expanded. Successful services that aren't generating revenue are monetized. Unsuccessful services are discontinued if it looks like they're not going to become successful.
The Chromecast seems to be very successful, and to have an obvious and successful revenue model in place (YouTube). I don't think it's going anywhere.
(Disclaimer: I work for Google, but don't speak for Google.)
Re:Most unsurprising explanation is the most likel (Score:4, Interesting)
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I'm sure it wasn't their most popular service, but then again, there probably didn't cost them much to run.
it's just math. google exists to make money. if they were making $ with reader, it'd still be around. they aren't a non-profit, so argument like "it didn't cost that much" are irrelevant. google may allow some losing services to exist, but it's because they see future potential in them. RSS readership has been on a downward trend for some time.
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It should be pointed out...is an API change undocumented if the API itself is documented??
Or... is it an API at all if it's undocumented?
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I guess so. Unless you think it should be called an `undocumented API` in that case. Doesn't seem to bring much to the table; calling it something else would bring even less.
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That's crap. Do you think they didn't test this 'change' before pushing it out? Of course they did. BTW, changing the API so it won't stream local content is still just changing the API.
The ChromeCast hasn't been out long enough for products to be taking advantage of "undocumented" APIs when the whole thing is too new to have anything realy built around it.
You are just completely wrong. This whole kerfluffle was because the API was changed in such a way that Koush's aircast app for android stopped working. An app that used some undocumented API's to work around google's device whitelisting system. So yes, I'm sure google tested this thing. And (if you believe them), they still don't mind local content playing through it (which is likely, as they never broke streaming local content via a chrome tab). But if changing an undocumented API breaks a 3rd party app (
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Perhaps so... another explanation is that the removal was generating bad PR. If there hadn't been Slashdot coverage of the loss of the capability, they might have continued with some plan of removing the capability I suppose we will never know.
If they truly want to be non-evil; they'll provide a documented stable API to expose the hardware's functionality -- instead of just undocumented API they keep randomly changing in minor updates.
Re:Most unsurprising explanation is the most likel (Score:5, Insightful)
But it is the style of those content providers whose apps leave messages like, "This content is not available on mobile"
and "You cannot play content while a second display is enabled"
And if you could cast any media class, then all of a sudden, those messages just wouldn't matter.
And content providers would pull their apps claiming they no longer have control over where it's displayed.
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listen up AC, it wasn't only videos that you've loaded onto the device.
Koush's work included DIALing anything with a media class. That included any video or audio capable app.
And that's why the loophole is closed.
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An undocumented API has changed. Now can we stop overreacting?
How is the API undocumented [google.com]?
Developers might also want to take note of the following:
Warning: The current Google Cast SDK is a preview SDK intended for development and testing purposes only, not for production apps. Google may change this SDK significantly prior to the official release of the Google Cast SDK.
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So, it is better to be incompetent than to be evil?
Because any decent software developer would test something as basic as local playback *before* doing a release.
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So, it is better to be incompetent than to be evil?
Because any decent software developer would test something as basic as local playback *before* doing a release.
It's got a SDK that is in developer preview and subject to change. Why is this so hard to understand on a supposedly technical site? When the SDK is stable, and it gets changed to disallow local playback (or the SDK somehow never makes it to a stable release), *then* we can all jump up and down. Calm the hell down, consumer devices have been released like this for years now. The iPhone didn't have a stable SDK on its first release, later it did. Chromecast doesn't, later it will.
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Lies, Lies, Lies. (Score:4, Funny)
Google bad. Microsoft good. Get it right people!
We have always been at war with Google (Score:5, Funny)
Microsoft has always been our ally.
In other news, the chocolate rations will be increased this week, and there's been another winner in the lottery!
Today's lottery (Score:2)
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Microsoft has always been our ally.
We have always been at war with Least Pays-yah.
I imagine the folks on Big Brother's PA are playing a most wicked game of Telephone (Chinese Whispers in metric).
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Testing balloon (Score:1)
This is called a Testing Balloon, just like Microsoft with their XBone restrictions.
Fear not! More attempts will come after this died down, what Google cannot make money out of, Google will discontinue eventually.
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what Google cannot make money out of, Google will discontinue eventually.
Er... yes? What world do you live in where this isn't true of any business?
No shit (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, people fucking pointed this multiple times (here and elsewhere), but this rather important tidbit was lost among the noise that is misguided Internet rage.
The Internet is extremely good at pushing things out of context or missing that little bit of info that completely changes the meaning of something. Like that image of Will Smith's family looking shocked over Miley Cyrus' act at the VMAs even though the picture-in-picture clearly showed it was Lady Gaga's act. But hey, people love to not pay attention to the details. It's faster that way.
Re:Correction: It's all the same shit. (Score:3)
The Internet is extremely good at pushing things out of context or missing that little bit of info that completely changes the meaning of something.
You mistake strength for weakness. Imagine such levels of hue and cry and demanding of accountability in the mainstream populous -- Such is missing even over things that actually really matter.
'Tis better to Sense Emphatically and waste a few cycles for self correction than Decide to dismiss threats by default and Act far too late. For the first time in your planet's history businesses can respond nearly instantly to customer demands. Just look at the Xbone, for a recent example. The point is that if
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Yeah, people fucking pointed this multiple times (here and elsewhere), but this rather important tidbit was lost among the noise that is misguided Internet rage.
Its not the Internet -- its an overall rise in douchebaggery and exploding belief that ones' instinctual sense of the truth is, in fact, always the truth. Its permeating society -- not just in the US, but globally. I think the only thing the Internet contributes to it is the ease at which it allows people to wall themselves off in a like-minded narrow community that will consistently produce and echo messages that resonate with that narrow viewpoint. For some reason -- probably because so many people have j
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The truth is that Google has terminated the means by which streaming to local was achieved without creating new ones. How is that not Google breaking ChromeCast local streaming? How is your response not to be outraged that instead of adding a facility to enable local streaming to the SDK, they continued to "overlook" this feature which nearly every user wants in yet another SDK version, while simultaneously destroying the feature that was being used to provide it?
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The SDK is NOT FINAL, correct?
An SDK that is being built is by definition subject to change, INCLUDING BREAKING THINGS (advertently or inadvertently). When the SDK is final, or even VERY VERY close to final, and something is STILL broken, then whine.
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The tech press (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately much of the tech press content consists of (paid?) product announcements, unsubstantiated rumour, and reviews of dubious quality.
Google was up front about there being no Chromecast apps until the SDK was released, at the very beginning. This was never a story.
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Do you have any numbers to back that up?
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Thing is, one needs to keep in mind that AirCast was abusing a loophole in Google's whitelisting process (which is in place while the SDK is in beta) - It was behaving as if it were an instance of the Chromecast extension for Chrome.
One thing Koush never indicated was whether this change affected SDK-based apps like his original (unreleased due to the current licensing of the beta SDK) local content playback app.
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Unfortunately much of the tech press content consists of (paid?) product announcements, unsubstantiated rumour, and reviews of dubious quality.
RODQs?
I don't think they really exist.
Re:A distinction without a difference (Score:5, Informative)
Except when your SDK is in beta and explicitly states that apps are not to be distributed without your approval until the SDK comes out of beta.
In this case, I'm not sure if it's even an SDK change - it's a removal of an exploit that was used to allow a non-whitelisted unofficial app to behave like a whitelisted one.
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It makes a huge difference. If they are intentionally breaking it that means the software will never be allowed to work. If its just a matter of churn in a preview SDK, which developers were warned about, its really the fault of the developers releasing prematurely (there's a joke about premature release in there somewhere). The alternative would be Google to fully develop the SDK without third party input and release it. As a software developer I'd rather give input before release when things can get fi
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Sober Reflection (Score:2)
I think it's a good time for us all to take a step back and reflect on the (many very reactionary) comments made after the "Google breaks Chromecast" story the other day.
http://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/13/08/25/2254208/google-breaks-chromecasts-ability-to-play-local-content [slashdot.org]
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A Question about Chromecast stream resolution (Score:2)
In the case of the Chromecast which is presumably displaying to a 1920x10820 display, is there some sort of passthrough signalling that will let the streaming device use a more appropriate resolution? Or do I only get the same resolution as the intermediate device?
On
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On a related note, can somebody tell me why this device is desirable? I'm still struggling with the use case here. What is the benefit of Chromecast over something like teeny little wdtv box? It's smaller and cheaper but does a lot less.
It's a small, extremely portable, self-contained media streaming device. It can be powered entirely by the TV, and controlled remotely from an android device. It is potentially possible for this little device to replace a lot of the other boxes hanging off your TV. When you go on vacation or to a friend's house you can very easily throw it in a bag and take it with you, without losing any settings. You also get all that for only $35, with 3 months of Netflix included (if you order from the right place).
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What is the advantage of this over DLNA/UPnP? I get the streaming of Netflix, etc, but why wouldn't this be possible using DLNA? Why not use standards that are already established and work on most televisions bought in the past couple of years?
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What is the advantage of this over DLNA/UPnP? I get the streaming of Netflix, etc, but why wouldn't this be possible using DLNA? Why not use standards that are already established and work on most televisions bought in the past couple of years?
Personally I don't think it's better, I would love if it could be used as a generic UPnP device. I'm really hoping someone figures out a way to make that happen. I managed to snag the 3 months of free Netflix when it was first offered, so I'm willing to gamble $11 or so that someone will find a way to do it. But at that price, even if they don't, I still have a mildly useful device without spending a lot of money.
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From the right place?
What does that mean? The well known free 3 months of netflix offer ended less than a day after orders became available.
Is the offer still available somewhere else? I'm one of those who would be more tempted to get one with the 3 free months of netflix even though of course I can afford it. If it did Amazon Prime Instant Video, I'd likely get one anyway.
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I believe the offer is available again when purchased from a physical BestBuy store.
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Thanks, that should get modded informative if it's indeed true!
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Here is the bestbuy web page showing the 3-months of netflix is back for both online and in-store purchases.
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Chromecast+HDMI+Streaming+Media+Player/9071056.p?id=1219013308425&skuId=9071056&st=Chromecast&cp=1&lp=1 [bestbuy.com]
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When I stream video from Netflix, the server chooses an encoding and resolution specific to the device running their client software. I assume that other video streaming servers behave in the same manner: why stream HD to a 320x800 display?
In the case of the Chromecast which is presumably displaying to a 1920x10820 display, is there some sort of passthrough signalling that will let the streaming device use a more appropriate resolution? Or do I only get the same resolution as the intermediate device?
Yes, the Chromecast delivers at a higher resolution. Basically what happens is the intermediary device (phone, tablet, etc.) sends the video information to the Chromecast, and it logs into Netflix itself and behaves as a native player on a large screen. I was pleasantly surprised that I wasn't even prompted to log into Netflix on the larger display.
On a related note, can somebody tell me why this device is desirable? I'm still struggling with the use case here. What is the benefit of Chromecast over something like teeny little wdtv box? It's smaller and cheaper but does a lot less.
Well, two out of three ain't bad. :) The biggest downside for me is that you have to have an Android device kicking around to act as the remote control.