Software rendering wmode issue on Android

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Software rendering wmode issue on Android

(11 posts) (3 voices)

Started 9 months ago by KicksaintNick
Latest reply from KicksaintNick

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KicksaintNick

Novice Bird
Joined: Jul '12
Posts: 9

Hi guys,

wmode seems to be quite the discussion on here and while I've looked up a lot of forum articles or used the trusted Google search, I haven't found a solution to my problem.

I have a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and I've been building a Starling app on it for little less than a month now. It runs really well with GPU acceleration at a constant 60 fps, which is amazing

My problem however is when I try to set the render mode to "software" it gives me a wmode error.

I've tried the following:
Changing my render mode from direct to CPU, GPU and auto (none of which seems to work)
I've tried exporting to Adobe Air 3.2, 3.3 and 3.4 beta, obviously changing the SWF version as I do this and adjusting the descriptor value
I also tried fiddling with the full screen value in the app xml
I also tried setting a 16 bit colour depth in the app xml

Here is my initial window code:
<initialWindow>
<title>App</title>
<content>app.swf</content>
<visible>true</visible>
<fullScreen>true</fullScreen>
<renderMode>direct</renderMode>
<systemChrome>none</systemChrome>
<aspectRatio>landscape</aspectRatio>
<autoOrients>false</autoOrients>
</initialWindow>

I also have this in my Android section:
<colorDepth>16bit</colorDepth>

I use FlashDevelop for all my Air projects. This only occurs when I'm trying to force software mode. Any help with this will be appreciated.

Posted 9 months ago #
sHTiF

Moderating Owl
Joined: Oct '11
Posts: 827

To use starling you need to use direct wmode none of the others will work as direct is the one mandatory for Stage3D usage. So I am not sure what are you trying to do.

Posted 9 months ago #
KicksaintNick

Novice Bird
Joined: Jul '12
Posts: 9

Hey sHTiF, thanks for the quick response.

I'm trying to test performance in software mode, my render mode in my app xml is always on direct. If I run "Context3DRenderMode.AUTO" the app starts fine on the tablet and in the output it indicates that it is using OpenGL but if I set "Context3DRenderMode.SOFTWARE" I get a wmode message.

Posted 9 months ago #
sHTiF

Moderating Owl
Joined: Oct '11
Posts: 827

What kind of message? Stage3D SOFTWARE requires direct wmode as well so if you have direct wmode and initialize Stage3D in Context3DRenderMode.SOFTWARE it should work, even though it will work really really slow.

Posted 9 months ago #
KicksaintNick

Novice Bird
Joined: Jul '12
Posts: 9

Haha yeah I don't doubt it will be pretty slow :p

When I run in Context3DRenderMode.Auto, I successfully start the application and Starling initializes with the following in the output window:
[Starling] Initialization complete.
[Starling] Display Driver:OpenGL Vendor=NVIDIA Corporation Version=OpenGL ES 2.0 Renderer=NVIDIA Tegra GLSL=OpenGL ES GLSL 1.00 (Baseline Constrained)

When I change to Context3DRenderMode.SOFTWARE. I get the following message displaying on a black background on the tablet:
"This application is not correctly embedded (wrong wmode value)"

My render mode is set to direct, I just find it weird that the issue only presents itself when I change from "auto" to "software"

Posted 9 months ago #
sHTiF

Moderating Owl
Joined: Oct '11
Posts: 827

Strange indeed, the truth is I never tried to initialize AIR up in software though. Maybe a bug.

Posted 9 months ago #
KicksaintNick

Novice Bird
Joined: Jul '12
Posts: 9

It seems so, after trying it in a clean project in FlashDevelop and getting the same issue I'm leaning towards bug. Hopefully Daniel will know what the issue is.

My reason for trying to force software mode is to debug some memory specific issues I'm having with my application. From what I understand about Stage3D, if you're not making use of the GPU all operations go to the CPU and all your visual data should be forced into application memory. I should then be able to find out if I have any memory leaks and also test the performance for applications which do not have GPU support.

Posted 9 months ago #
sHTiF

Moderating Owl
Joined: Oct '11
Posts: 827

Software mode can have entirely different memory footpring though as it uses a custom 3rd party software renderer to do the actual GPU emulation.

Posted 9 months ago #
KicksaintNick

Novice Bird
Joined: Jul '12
Posts: 9

Does GPU emulation make use of application memory? For debugging memory issues even if the memory footprint is different I should be able to find a memory leak if it's forced into the application memory cause I can view this information via the Starling Stats class. It's the only option I've considered cause the application I'm developing makes use of 3 native Android extensions as well as the CameraUI and CameraRoll so profiling on the laptop isn't possible :/

Posted 9 months ago #
frisk

Senior Bird
Joined: Jan '12
Posts: 113

I can confirm the incorrect wmode display when combined with Software mode.
I tested it on a Samsung Galaxy S1 phone (Android 2.2).

So probably it might be an AIR related issue, as the error will be thrown by the Stage3D (Context3D creation) itself.

Could you file an issue on the Adobe support site?

Posted 9 months ago #
KicksaintNick

Novice Bird
Joined: Jul '12
Posts: 9

Thanks Frisk, I'm struggling to log into the bug support site at the moment but I'll issue one as soon as I can

Posted 9 months ago #

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