1746557 - (webcodecs) [meta] Implement the WebCodecs API

Status: NEW

(Core :: Audio/Video: Web Codecs, task, P1)

Description

[C.M.Chang[:chunmin]]

This bug tracks the WebCodecs API https://w3c.github.io/webcodecs/ implementation.

Comment 8

[u720025]

[redacted - mhoye]

Comment 9

[James Graham [:jgraham]]

Interop 2023 Tests

Comment 11

[Kagami Rosylight [:saschanaz] (they/them)]

(Please file a separate security issue if you found one and you are not a bot.)

Comment 12

[Roger Sanders]

Thank you for actioning this. We're currently developing a commercial product which relies on WebCodecs support (specifically VideoDecoder), and I'm glad to see that there has been a formal announcement of the intent to implement this in FireFox:
https://groups.google.com/a/mozilla.org/g/dev-platform/c/3g0fnn6682A/m/Nb1qVaA4AAAJ
This will bring FireFox in line with the other major browsers out there, which have all added WebCodecs support over the last two years. I've pulled down the latest nightly build and seen the progress here, and it's encouraging.

I have one specific question I haven't seen a direct answer to yet though, which relates to HEVC/H.265 support. Over the last 12 months, every other major browser has added pass-through support for hardware H265 decoding, where the platform supports it:
https://caniuse.com/?search=h.265
In reality, this means basically every platform in the world, since all graphics vendors have implemented hardware decoding for PC hardware, and mobile devices had hardware decoding since early on. As I understand it, pass-through decoding like this does not require any patent licenses or the like, since it's the hardware vendor that is doing the actual decoding, and they've already paid the fee to license the codec.

Is the intention to also add pass-through HEVC/H.265 decoding in FireFox for the WebCodecs API, either during the initial effort or as a following step?

I'm well aware of the benefits of AV1, and look forward to using it in the future instead of H265 once hardware support is common enough, but for now we need to be able to support H265 as a baseline, with AV1 being an extension we can reach for where it's supported. Right now I can list every other significant browser as either "supported" (Chrome, Edge, Opera, Samsung Internet, etc) or "supported in TP" (Safari on iOS, Safari on MacOS), which will give us comprehensive browser support across all significant platforms within the next two months. Except Firefox currently. Are there any plans, intent, or notional support for implementing H265 passthrough hardware decoding in this effort or a subsequent effort?

Comment 13

[Stefan Fleiter (:sfleiter)]

I see meta bug 1842838 and bug 1849392 for Windows.
For Mac or Linux I do not see respective tracking, let's see whether we get any answer on that. 😀

Comment 14

[C.M.Chang[:chunmin]]

H254 isn't free for all. We are looking into it and see what we can do

Comment 15

[Neal Gompa[:Conan Kudo]]

As I understand it, pass-through decoding like this does not require any patent licenses or the like, since it's the hardware vendor that is doing the actual decoding, and they've already paid the fee to license the codec.

FYI, this is not true. Most hardware vendors generally argue they do not need to pay the fee since they don't provide a "complete codec" out of the box. There's a lot of passing the buck here... :/

Comment 17

[Tobias Bora]

Who, is Webcodec now a thing in firefox? Just tested with 131.0.3 and it seems to work! I just have issues with jumping decoding (i.e. every X frame, the video is moved up or down by maybe 10px, but I guess it is a separate issue)

Comment 18

[Paul Adenot (:padenot)]

Please open a bug for this with a test case, thanks!

Comment 19

[Tobias Bora]

Thanks, this is done here https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1926054

Comment 20

[Jim Mathies [:jimm]]

Desktop support shipped in H1 2024, and is largely complete aside from bug fixing as users experiment with the implementation. Mobile support is still missing, which we're currently working on.