How to send audio/video to SideShow

Hi Evan,

Unfortunately the Windows Media Player gadget that is included with Windows Vista does not process any audio/video. Instead, it merely controls the media that is being played on your computer and provides basic feedback (ie: current track position) of the currently active media.

Each SideShow device provides implementations of one or more 'endpoints' and at the moment the majority of devices out there support SCF (Simple Content Format). SCF allows for basic XML pages to be sent to the device which are followed by lightweight messages from the device to the platform (i.e. navigation). For a device to support anything outside the scope of SCF you will need to find/create a device that supports these features. Unfortunately audo and video are outside the scope of SCF and therefore also not supported in current devices. To add support for audio/video you will need to create a new device that supports new endpoints that include Audio/Video playback. If you are creating a new device then yes you will need to write a driver.

A few devices include built-in gadgets. One example of which can play back music (the asus laptop for example). These gadgets are not true SideShow gadgets and operate independantly of the SideShow platform. They are built-in to the firmware and cannot be controlled by the platform.

The WDK provides an excellent reference point for writing device drivers for Windows SideShow drivers (http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa973528.aspx). To write a device you will need to be able to interpret the signals being sent by the driver and then render the content to the user. At a minimum there should be an SCF renderer included (to support all current gadgets) but you are free to extend this by including support for your own endpoint that processes audio/video.

I hope this answers your questions,

-james

tenorwoody85 at 2007-10-11 >