This is a transcript of one episode of the Samsung Developers Podcast, hosted by and produced by Tony Morelan. A listing of all podcast transcripts can be found here.
Host
Tony Morelan Senior Developer Evangelist, Samsung Developers
NOTE: Transcripts are provided by an automated service and reviewed by the Samsung Developers web team. Inaccuracies from the transcription process do occur, so please refer to the audio if you are in doubt about the transcript.
Tony Morelan 00:01
Hey, I'm Tony Morelan. And this is POW, the Samsung Developers podcast where we chat with innovators using Samsung technologies, award winning app developers and designers, as well as insiders working on the latest Samsung tools. Welcome to season two, episode six. On today's show, I'm joined again by Dan Appelquist from Samsung internet. But along with Dan this time will be several of the developer advocates that work with Dan that help developers build for the Samsung internet browser. During our chat, we'll talk with experts on building responsive web experiences for foldable devices, privacy and security on the web, and exciting new technologies related to web XR in the Samsung internet browser. Enjoy. Hey, Dan, welcome back to the podcast.
Dan Appelquist 00:48
Great to be back. Thanks for having me back.
Tony Morelan 00:51
Yeah, so I've already asked who is Dan Appelquist on the earlier episode. But for those that don't know, you are the director of developer advocacy for Samsung internet. And I would highly recommend that you go back and listen to our episode from season one.
Dan Appelquist 01:05
It was great. I loved doing that.
Tony Morelan 01:08
Yeah. So last season, we had you on the podcast, we talked about the Samsung internet browser web standards, the importance of privacy and security in things like progressive web apps,
Dan Appelquist 01:18
right. And you'll probably hear some of the same things that you heard last year. But hopefully, I'm going to give you something new as well.
Tony Morelan 01:27
In this new episode, though, I understand that you actually have some of your few of your experts from your team that are going to join us and give us a deeper understanding of Samsung internet, as well as some new and exciting topics. Correct.
Dan Appelquist 01:37
That's right, developer advocacy for us as a team effort. So I'm really excited to have the team here talking about the different areas of expertise that they're that they're working in, and the different technologies that they're playing a part in
Tony Morelan 01:50
for new listeners. Let me ask again, what is Samsung internet.
Dan Appelquist 01:55
So Samsung internet is a browser, it's a web browser, it's a browser, that Samsung ship on all Android devices. So if you have any kind of Android device from Samsung, your default browser is going to be Samsung internet. We're the purple planet that you might see on any Samsung Android device. We are also available on other devices besides Samsung devices. So you can actually download us from the Play Store, you can download us from the galaxy store as well. So that's pretty exciting. Because it means for developers especially it means that you actually don't have to have a Samsung device in order, you know, we certainly encourage you to have a Samsung device. But if you don't have a Samsung device, you can still load and test your website in Samsung internet, which is definitely something that we suggest you do.
Tony Morelan 02:49
So what does Samsung have a browser in the first place?
Dan Appelquist 02:52
Well, I think it comes back to the question of why do we have multiple browsers the web is enriched and is in continues to evolve. Because we have a dynamic in the web where users can choose people can choose which browser they want to use the web with. And they can make that choice based on what they perceive to be the browser that gives them the best user experience the best features, you can access the same websites with all the browsers, that's the idea. We'd never want to see a web where you go to a website, and it says, can only be accessed in Google Chrome or can only be accessed in Microsoft Edge or can only be accepted Samsung internet, that would not be a good web to live in. So when it comes to interoperability, the web is extremely interoperability for the web is extremely important. However, it's at the level of all the features on top of the web browser that helps you to experience the web, where web browsers differentiate and compete. And that's that is a really important dynamic because it helps the web to grow. We've seen in the past how when one browser dominates the entire web innovation on the web stagnates. And we never want to see those days return again, that was early 2000s. When I he was like the single I think that 90% market share or something like that. So strategically, we're pretty certain that having multiple browsers out there and having this dynamic and this conversation about what the best features are, is really important for the web, and it's really important for people who are using the web at the end of the day.
Tony Morelan 04:39
Yeah, yeah, definitely. I think that sort of competition is what helps, you know, drive these companies to come up with new and innovative ways to improve the technology. Absolutely. So um, so let's talk about the chromium project. So I understand that Samsung internet is based on chromium. chromium is the Google led open source browser project to build a safer, faster more stable way for Internet users to experience the web, correct?
Dan Appelquist 05:04
That's correct. Yeah. So I mean, Google Chrome is based on chromium. There are lots of other browsers that are also based on chromium. So Microsoft Edge is based on chromium. Samsung internet is based on chromium. There are a lot of other browsers that are based on chromium. Brave is a great browser for desktop that is based on chromium that has a real strong focus on privacy and Vivaldi is another one. That is, again, they have a focus on serving developers on desktop. So there's a real good ecosystem of chromium-based browsers out there. And we're very happy to be one of the most used, if not the most, I think we are the most used chromium browser out there besides Chrome. Well, so as for what our role is, in the chromium project, we definitely take the basic chromium build. And we, we put Samsung internet on top of that, however, we are also contributing back into the chromium project. So we're, we're a strong contributor into the open source chromium project. And we also take the chromium project, and we build Samsung internet on top of it, which means building a lot of our own user interface on a lot of our own features. And some of those features are the things that we're going to talk about today. So what's
Tony Morelan 06:26
the role of the developer advocacy team?
Dan Appelquist 06:29
So we have a small team, we are based in London, what we do is, we talk to developers, we blog, we write code, we are at heart developers, who are technologists, who know how to speak developer because we are developers. And we all have experience building production websites, production code. And we also are, so we're out there, we're communicating. But we're also listening. And part of our role is to listen to the developer community channel. The feedback from the developer community back into our engineering group. We're very adamant that developer advocacy is an engineering effort. We work most closely with our engineering team, both in Seoul and in the US. And we also play a role when it comes to internet standards or web standards. So a number of us are playing leadership roles in different w three c working groups, W three C is the web standards organization, the World Wide Web Consortium, which was founded by Tim Berners. Lee, I co-chair something called the technical architecture group there, which is like a review board for new web technologies. Ada, who you're going to hear from is the co-chair of the immersive web Working Group, which is working on web XR. All the team members are playing some kind of role when it comes to web standards, which is important for us as well. So having said all that, I'd like to first of all, introduce Laura to the podcast, who's going to tell you more about what we're doing with foldables. And with responsive design.
Tony Morelan 08:14
Hey, Laura, welcome to the podcast.
Laura Morinigo 08:16
Thanks, Tony. How are you?
Tony Morelan 08:18
Very good. Very good. So let me first ask what is your role at Samsung? Yeah, so
Laura Morinigo 08:24
it's going to be two years that I'm part of the Developer Relations team. So I'm a web developer advocate for Samsung internet. Wonderful. And
Tony Morelan 08:33
you are based in London. Is that correct?
Laura Morinigo 08:36
Exactly. In London, UK.
Tony Morelan 08:38
Now, I will say that you don't sound like you have a British accent. So where are you originally from?
Laura Morinigo 08:43
Really? I don't. I'm originally from Argentina. Yes,
Tony Morelan 08:49
yes. And I do know that you actually are working with my counterpart, Diego Lizarazo. Who speaks Spanish as well. You two are doing some webinars together. Is that correct?
Laura Morinigo 09:00
Yeah, exactly. We're doing Samsung and Española. That means Samsung in Spanish, where we do workshops, and things like that. And actually, we're going to have something in June. So stay tuned, guys. Nice
Tony Morelan 09:13
looking forward to that. So we're here to talk about foldable devices and Samsung internet first, can you tell me what exactly is a foldable device?
Laura Morinigo 09:21
Well, yeah, full levels are devices in which the screen falls and you have an inch, and there are mainly two different physical form of factors. So you have devices with a single flexible screen. Those are called seamless and devices with two screens, which seem and Samsung Lund two main devices which are seamless, the galaxy see sleep and then sec four, two. What does this mean for developers? Yes, so everything that is new for users is new for developers to because for develop First means new ways to create content. With foldables, you have the chance to do multitasking, open more than one up at the same time and take advantage of the biggest screen. It's like you have in the tablet inside your pocket. So developers now you can create new ways to reach out to users, including from multimedia to different types of websites.
Tony Morelan 10:29
Sure, sure. Now, I know that, obviously, when, when you've got your phone and you're holding it vertical, and then you rotate it sideways, you know, the content generally changes. And that's called responsive designs. Yeah. How is that related to foldable?
Laura Morinigo 10:43
Yeah, responsive design means that you create your web app, and the web app should be adapted to whatever the screen size of the device is. So it doesn't matter. If you open your web app into a smartphone, or in desktop, it should look good, right? So developers that are familiar with responsive design, they're not going to find any difficulties adjusting the content to this new devices. Because right now, foldables, as allows you to have more than one screen at the same time, that the size of the viewport change. So you still need to apply responsive design, responsive design is a must that will help your web app, improve its SEO and make it accessible. And weight foldables is going to bring new functionalities that can be a productivity Game Changer and even make the tablet experience more portable, and even explore are the different features.
Tony Morelan 11:44
Now I know with this new technology, it's got to be difficult to start developing for it without having standards. So is that something that you're working on for foldables?
Laura Morinigo 11:55
Exactly. So we know that it's really important for developers to have a certain kind of guidance, and for the users so they can have a really good user experience. So in order to do that, we started exploring, which are the right approaches to develop web apps for foldable devices. And in partnership with other companies like, for example, Microsoft and Intel, we started to take up and lead to thinking about responsive design, to take into consideration the different form factor of the screens of the device itself. There is currently a standard Working Draft, that is called device poster, where we actually show to the developer, which is the current posture that the device is having, for example, if it's flip, if it's just in a vertical position. Also, the developer can take advantage of that information and create cool stuff, of course. So what's the best way for developers to get started with developing for foldables? Yes, so again, if you already have some experience with responsive design, you still need to apply the same rules to start developing web apps for foldables. But besides that, you need to keep in mind that there are new things that you need to implement. In order to do that you have some resources in our blog posts, we usually post most of the things that you have to keep in mind new rules or testing that we are doing with these new devices. Follow the standards that we are actually doing, be part of the conversation. And Samsung recently launched in its remote Test Lab, the test to actually test with a ritual foldable device so you can check your web app in that device.
Tony Morelan 13:54
So you actually don't have to own a foldable device. Exactly. Yeah. It's an actual real device. From what I understand you're just controlling it online. Exactly. Do you have any examples of use cases where developers are taking advantage of foldable devices?
Laura Morinigo 14:09
Yes, of course, as I mentioned before, if the user can take advantage of this device, for example, doing multitasking, and so on, developers can do and that's the idea. One of the new ways that these phones take advantage to developers are for example, with games. Users are really excited when they have the chance to play their games in bigger screens. So developers are trying to take approach of these advantage and make their web apps will fit into a better screen size to improve the user experience. The other way that foldables are changing the game and is like an innovation is the dependent of the posture of, of the device, you can do different things. For example, if you have a flip, and if it's in a flip mode, you can actually use your one on one screen to watch video, or even make calls. And then you see in the in the in the front screen, the camera, and then in the other screen, you see the console. So it's made a better use of currently, what you can do in your web app.
Tony Morelan 15:35
Yeah, sounds like you can really turn your device into being much more versatile. So are there any features coming in the near future that we can get excited about?
Laura Morinigo 15:43
Yeah, I think, you know, these initiative was started by Samsung, and then other companies followed. And I think that's a good case, because it means that it's not just a trend, I believe that these things related with responsive design, and hardware innovation are coming further. So even when we talk about dual screen or the way that you sir can see their content. So the very first part, I will say, let's see how their users react at these foldable devices, I think most of the feedback is really positive. So that means that new things are coming.
Tony Morelan 16:28
So what's the best way for developers to follow you and learn more about what you have to offer related to Samsung, Canada and foldables?
Laura Morinigo 16:36
Great, so we usually write our blog posts in Samsung internet blog posts, and you can follow us at in our social media Samsung internet. The same with medium, you can find our articles there in some of the events that we participate soon. In my case, you can follow me on Twitter, my Twitter is Paul, this is Lada, okay.
Tony Morelan 17:01
And I will include all of the links to this in the show notes so you can easily get to those with Laura, it was great to have you on the podcast and just wanted to say thanks for giving us a little insight into Samsung internet and foldable devices.
Laura Morinigo 17:14
Amazing. And thanks for having me.
Dan Appelquist 17:16
By the way, Tony, I'm also really excited about the work that Laura has been doing with Diego from your team around Spanish language developer outreach. That's a whole another area that we're very committed to in terms of reaching out to more to wider developer and the wider developer community.
Tony Morelan 17:35
Yeah, that's one thing that I've realized too, is how well we are expanding our reach with not just you know, us or people based in, you know, in in the UK, but we really are reaching out to this global community of developers. So it's great to see what Diego and Laura are doing as far as the Spanish speaking developers.
Dan Appelquist 17:53
Yeah, that's really good. So. So next, I would like to introduce Lola from my team, who is focusing on privacy. She has been, amongst other things, participating in the privacy community group in WCC, which is one of the forums in which we talk about emerging privacy technologies that are being added to the web. And she's going to tell you a bit about what we're doing in Samsung internet when it comes to privacy.
Tony Morelan 18:29
Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
Lola Odelola 18:31
Thank you for having me.
Tony Morelan 18:33
Yeah. So tell me what is your role at Samsung.
Lola Odelola 18:36
So I am a web developer advocate on the Samsung internet team got it.
Tony Morelan 18:41
So let's talk about privacy and Samsung internet. Knowing that just about everything we do online can be tracked what privacy features are integrated into the Samsung internet browser experience that gives users more control over their privacy and their data?
Lola Odelola 18:53
Yeah, so the Samsung internet actually has a lot of features baked into it that kind of highlight its private nature, if you will. One of those features is the privacy dashboard, which shows you the number of items that were blocked in a certain time period. It shows you where that blocked backward Reis directions or pop ups or apps that open you know, sometimes apps will just try and open the internet, it will show you if there are any apps like that, that it blocks as well. So it's quite detailed actually in that regard. And it also it also allows you to set settings about if you want warnings about malicious sites, or if you want to block automatic downloads, and is actually in this dashboard where you would set smart anti tracking too, which is another feature. Basically, smart anti tracking is Samsung Internet's way of giving the user the ability to say that you don't want to be tracked online. So it Automatically renews tracking cookies, which are way for basically websites to track your behavior and things online. So if you want to switch that setting on, you can do that from the privacy and security dashboard. And you can have it to always be in on you can have it to never been on or you can have it to secret mode only, which is like when you have incognito mode or, like when you're in incognito, you can switch off tracking in there, as well. So yeah,
Tony Morelan 20:27
so what about ads? How does, you know, I get a lot of ads that always pop up when I'm visiting websites.
Lola Odelola 20:33
Yeah. So the cool thing about the Samsung internet browser is that we have the ability to download third party ad blockers. And what makes that unique is that you don't have to go to the galaxy store. Or you have to go to any App Store to download these ads. Because the App Store is very heavily integrated into Samsung internet, you can actually download them directly from the browser. Whereas with other internet browsers, you'd have to download from their
Tony Morelan 21:04
app store equivalent. Sure, sure. Well, it makes it really easy, then.
Lola Odelola 21:07
Yeah, straightforward.
Tony Morelan 21:09
How can developers learn more about web standards? No, that's pretty important when it comes to developing.
Lola Odelola 21:13
Yeah, so like, as the web advocate team, we are very involved in web standards. And developers can like get to know more about that by following our work, particularly work we're doing. So like in the privacy community group, which is public and open to everybody. Where we discuss things like the global privacy control, it's not yet a web standard, but it's something being worked on by a host of different organizations, different people, from people from the New York Times to the BBC, to, you know, lots of different orgs. And the idea behind the global privacy control, is that you have a one stop shop to indicate your tracking preferences.
Tony Morelan 21:55
So does that mean that users really have the ability then to decide what they want to be tracked? And what they don't want to be tracked?
Lola Odelola 22:03
I'm not quite what it means is that so you know how you go on a website? And it says, Hey, do you want to be tracked? And you might say, No, and then you go to another website? And it says, Hey, do you want to be tracked? And you're like, no. And you know, if you answer No, for one place, you probably mean no, for, you know, everywhere, you probably don't want anywhere tracking you. So what the global privacy control says is that instead of having all these different, you know, pop ups that come up, every time you visit a website, that is a one stop shop in your browser, that you can say, I do not want to be tracked, or I do not want my data sold, or whatever the case may be. And when a website, when you visit a website, that website should read that signal from that control. And then it shouldn't even show you that box, it should even show you that pop up of Do you want to be tracked? Because it should have already read it? Got it? Okay. Okay.
Tony Morelan 22:55
Okay, great. Yeah. So do any scripts run on the browser or the device?
Lola Odelola 23:03
So no, which is? That's like, what GPC that's kind of what makes it cool that no scripts need to be run on the browser, or the device for this to work is going to be something that that is not going to be reliant on that, basically.
Tony Morelan 23:19
So is there any other work that you're supporting within web standards?
Lola Odelola 23:22
Yeah, I mean, there's loads. And, you know, we don't have time to list them all off now. But something else that we are really backing is the private click measurement, which is a way for users’ privacy to protected to be protected by removing tracking data, while still supporting click attribution across sites. And it's basically saying, we are not going to allow cross site tracking, but we are still going to collect those clicks. But there won't be any unique user data attached to those clicks. So you won't be able to follow Tony, through his browser history, essentially seen what he's clicked on. But you will be able to know that somebody, person T has clicked on these links. And you can collect analytics in an anonymous way that way.
Tony Morelan 24:11
So I've noticed this sometimes, like, I'll go to a website. And next thing, you know, I go over to Facebook. And now I see that there's an ad that is related to you know, something previously,
Lola Odelola 24:22
yeah, it's kind of similar. So basically, what these ad networks do is say, you know, you've got ad network.com has an ad on Twitter, and you click that ad on Twitter, and then you go over to Facebook and accident, same ad network.com has an ad on Facebook, and you click that link, both of those clicks go to ad network.com servers, and they are not able to build a profile of you based on the ads that you've clicked on to see what you're interested in. So now when you visit you know these sites you do now get ads related to those like these, I mean, basically creates like this like mesh network of clicks around the internet of things you've touched around the internet and build a picture of who you are.
Tony Morelan 25:05
So in other words, what you're saying is with private click measurement, only the ad companies know that their ads been clicked, but they're not able to really follow you know, my journey on Yeah, okay, gotcha. Okay. So how can developers become more aware of web standards to influence the influence of their work?
Lola Odelola 25:23
Um, yeah. So as I said before, the best way would be to get involved with WCC, and the web standards work that's happening there. Now, I will say there is a bit of an accessibility issue because it is member only for some for like the working groups and stuff and you have to pay to become a member. However, there are public open free groups, you can be a part of such as the privacy community group, where a lot of web standards get discussed before then we've to work in groups. So for example, GPC private clicker measurement are both currently being discussed in the privacy community group. And there are other similar community groups as well.
Tony Morelan 26:02
Right now it says something. Can we include the link to that in the in the show notes for this podcast?
Lola Odelola 26:06
Yes.
Tony Morelan 26:07
Excellent. We'll make sure to do that. So what's the best way for developers to follow you and learn more about what you have to offer? Yeah, so if anyone's interested,
Lola Odelola 26:17
you can follow me on Twitter, I am at Lola Delilah, and you can check out my writing on the Samson internet blog. And I think those are the best two places. Awesome. Well,
Tony Morelan 26:27
Lola, thank you very much for being on the podcast today. And just wanted to say thanks for giving us insight into Samsung internet and privacy.
Lola Odelola 26:34
Thank you so much for having me, Tony.
Dan Appelquist 26:36
It's been great, really great to hear from Lola there about some of the things that we're doing to help keep users experience of the web more private. So I'd like to introduce ADA, from my team who's been focusing on web XR, she amongst other things, is the co-chair of the WCC immersive web working group where she's actually helping to build these standards. And she does a lot of work when it on building demonstrators began conferences and events, etc. To demonstrate the value and the exciting types of user experiences that can be built using these technologies. Joining ADA, we also have Kevin, who will be talking about 5g tours, which is a project that we participate in. And we're very excited about putting WebEx r into action in that project.
Tony Morelan 27:34
Ada Kevin, welcome to the podcast.
Ada Rose Cannon 27:37
Thank you so much for having us. It's great to be here.
Kevin Picchi 27:40
Yeah. Nice. Nice being here.
Tony Morelan 27:44
So ADA, let me first ask what is your role at Samsung?
Ada Rose Cannon 27:48
So I'm a developer advocate for the web browser Samsung internet. I'm as well as that. I'm also co-chair of the WCC immersive web groups. These are the groups that deal with making web XR work in
Tony Morelan 28:01
the browsers. And you're located in the UK. Is that correct?
Ada Rose Cannon 28:06
Yeah, based out of London. And Kevin, what about you? What
Tony Morelan 28:08
is your role at Samsung?
Kevin Picchi 28:10
So I'm also developer advocates, and I'm also based in the UK office as a doctor. But I do understand that
Tony Morelan 28:17
at this moment, you actually are not in London, is that correct?
Kevin Picchi 28:21
Exactly. I'm in Switzerland right now, in doing this.
Tony Morelan 28:25
What exactly is web XR?
Ada Rose Cannon 28:28
So what they saw is a browser API that lets you access the sensors and displays of immersive hardware. Via immersive hardware, I mean, things like virtual reality headsets, or augmented reality headsets. Even your smartphone is an AR capable device, provided it's like a pretty recent one. Often, modern fast smartphones are able to use machine learning in order to work out your surroundings to do good augmented reality. So what the axon lets you build a single experience that runs through the web browser that works on all of these different devices? Do you
Tony Morelan 29:04
have to install any applications or plugins or anything,
Ada Rose Cannon 29:09
it's great all the user needs to have installed as a browser. Sometimes if it's not already installed as a requirement by the browser, ar core or AR kit on smartphones may also need to be installed. But usually it should just work without needing to install any additional things to save on desktop computers or on particular, headset-based browsers. They will also have a built in. So if you go to a website, it will show you a scene that's 3d, maybe Web GL, you can then push a button and the auto immersive you're in vitality or enter the scene or an AR or let you put the 3d content over your environment. And they'll just work with one click of a button you're immersed straightaway. And that's really the power of web XR.
Tony Morelan 29:57
Nice. So tell me what would some of the benefits For WebXR,
Ada Rose Cannon 30:01
there are many benefits from doing XR on the web. So one of the really powerful abilities is that because you don't need to install anything from an app store, if you need to charge any money for what you're doing, you won't have an app store taking a cut. And that's always just a huge benefit. Yeah. On top of that, you're getting the instant engagement. So for example, if I wanted someone to check out a demo I build, I would send someone a URL, they would click the URL, the page would load in a few seconds, and they push the button and they're able to view it in augmented reality on whatever AR hardware they were using. Whereas if I don't do a native app, they'd have to download it from an app store. They'd have to install it, remember that it's installed, tap on it, open it up, request the permissions, and then they'd be able to enter AR. And just to all that process, you end up losing a lot of users. So not only is it a better experience for users, but as a as a product owner, you will also have much higher engagement. And that's really incredibly powerful.
Tony Morelan 31:12
Yeah, it sounds like it makes it really easy for people to experience AR and VR. So let's talk about some of the equipment that that's needed. So how does it support headsets.
Ada Rose Cannon 31:22
So the headset at the most popular device you'll find today is probably the Oculus quest two, which is the latest Oculus quest device that came out over Christmas. It supports virtual reality through web XR out the box through the browser. And they're one of the browsers that are really pushing the envelope when it comes to the web XR standards. They're doing some really amazing work. If you've got a headset, which you would tether to you to your computer, then you'd use it with Chrome.
Tony Morelan 31:51
If you're worried about something as simple as Google Cardboard, oh, yes, it actually
Ada Rose Cannon 31:55
works out of the box. If you have a cardboard headset, and you press Enter VR on the phones, it will use the VR core part of Android to deliver it through virtual reality, which you can just put into a cardboard headset. So that will actually work really well. And of course, if you're using any kind of smartphone, whether XR works great on Chrome and Samsung internet on Android devices.
Tony Morelan 32:20
So the other day I came across this, what I thought was a really cool website, it was had little dinosaurs that I could click and get inside their cage and actually, you know, scroll around with them and see all the different angles Is that a good example of Webber?
Ada Rose Cannon 32:34
Yeah, that's xrdinosaurs.com. This is a really fantastic example of everything web XR can do. It's actually maintained by one of the editors of the WebEx r spec, which is really cool. XR dinosaurs lets you experience the dinosaurs like flat 2d on a computer using normal Web GL. But if you have AR or VR equipment available, such as a smartphone, you can place the dinosaurs in your environment. So if you open it up on a phone, you can push the button and you can view the dinosaur standing around in your living room, which is incredibly cool. Or if you have a VR headset, you can put it on, and then you will be inside the cage with the dinosaur. And then you can walk around it. This is a really powerful example of the of the ways where the XR can support multiple different modalities of XR with a single build. Like there's not running different code for each one, like much of the code for VR and AR is still the same. You know,
Tony Morelan 33:36
another example I just realized was, I was shopping for furniture the other day and was on this this website where I could select different lamps, chairs, tables, and actually walk into my living room and place these different items in my living room and turn around and see exactly what it would look like in this environment. So again, good example of a web XR
Ada Rose Cannon 34:00
that's a perfect example. This is the kind of thing that web XR really excels at. So anything where it's really small, so where the user probably isn't dedicated enough to actually go out and download an app. But they probably still be interested in AR, if it's available anyway, anything like shops or promotional materials, that kind of thing is great, because then they can see it, enjoy it. And then when they leave, there's nothing left on their device to clutter them up. So there's much less reservation when it comes to actually trying it out. And that I think that's really powerful. I think the technology used to build that particular demo you were talking about was Google's model viewer project. And model viewer is fantastic for stuff like store pages and product views. You add the script to your page, and then you use the model view or tag to display a 3d model on the page which is already ready to go for augmented reality. So if you couldn't get it 3d model of your product in the gltf model format, then it's ready to go. And that's really powerful.
Tony Morelan 35:06
What I really enjoyed was the fact that there was nothing to download, I clicked a few buttons, and there was, so I can definitely see the benefit where WebEx are, there isn't that hurdle that somebody has to go over, which is the whole download installation, just to experience it, what would be the best way for developers to get started with web XR?
Ada Rose Cannon 35:26
Well, if you depend how quickly you want to get started. So if you want to get started, and you just you already have the 3d model, and you want to just be done straight away, model viewer is a great place to start. It lets you just with a single HTML tag and a script tag, you can have a 3d model, augmented reality ready in your browser and in your website. So that's really great. If you want something that's like still HTML based, and a great way to start if you're more of a beginner, and a frame is a fantastic place to start. I'll be honest, I've been doing graphics development for years. And I also still use a frame for almost all my products, just because it's so quick to get started. But also lets you dive in deep. Because a frame is based on the Library three j s, which is a JavaScript 3d library for working on Web GL, which has been around for a long time is extremely powerful. And so a frame kind of gives you the best of both worlds. But if you really want to get stuck in with the JavaScript and really get in with the nitty gritty, working directly with three js, or with Babylon js is a great way to go. But if you want more of an of a fully like integrated development environment for this kind of thing, so if you prefer the kind of all in one IT solution, then there's actually quite a few solutions here. So there's Amazon Sumerian, there's play Canvas, which is a fantastic engine. And there's a really new one that seems really powerful Wonderland engine. And of course, as the old classic unity, which has a unity export for what XR
Tony Morelan 37:07
excellent. Sounds like there's a lot of great tools for developers to get started with, with web XR. Kevin, let me ask you, how is Samsung internet involved with web XR?
Kevin Picchi 37:18
Well, we shipped web Xi by default inside of browser. And we always make sure to ship the latest modules out so the developers can benefit all the good from the
Tony Morelan 37:32
API. And what about Samsung phones? How well do they work with WebXR?
Kevin Picchi 37:37
all of them are compatible? As long as you have the Samsung internet browser installed on your phone? You can experience WebEx are
Tony Morelan 37:45
excellent. In AD, I know that you're working also on web standards. Can you tell me a little bit about web standards, maybe some of the challenges with that?
Ada Rose Cannon 37:54
Yeah, so as I mentioned earlier, I'm co-chair of the immersive web groups. These are the groups that are working on the standards that get built into web browsers that become the API's developers work with to build these experiences. And working on the web standards can be really challenging, because people have high expectations for the privacy you'd get from the web. Like you don't go to a website and expect them to immediately start spying on you through your camera, or doing anything really super dodgy. The web browser is there to protect you. And because we're adding new API's to the browser, we can't do anything that's going to breach this expectation of privacy and security. And because it's the web, it's also got to work for as many people as possible. So accessibility is also an incredibly important task. So these are the kinds of constraints you've got to work in. But on top of this, as graphics developers, we really want to get people working with the very latest features you can find in immersive hardware. And we want people to build the kinds of experiences that rival what you can find on Native. And so balancing these privacy and security expectations against letting people have the most access to the hardware is a real challenge, because a lot of the hardware to do with immersive hardware, such as augmented reality is to deal with revealing more information about the environment and letting the developers work with it. So for example, for something like working out where the user can place 3d models in the environment, the underlying engine actually can fully scan your environment and work out what the exact shape of stuff is and its color. But this is a lot of information, which is too much that a lot of experiences don't actually need. And so it would very easily let someone write an abusive application without giving too much additional functionality. So actually the early versions of real-world sensing in web XR just let you query a single point from a single Ray at a time. So this lets you do stuff like placing a single object on the floor on the walls. But we're not exactly scanner through someone's room. And this is the kind of balances we have to make. And because we have had developers come back to us and say they do need like higher precision, more wide scope, scan, like room scanning. This is the kind of thing where we can build an additional API to, to let developers have this. But at the same time, we can warn the users that what the developer is trying to do might potentially be more dangerous. Just like when a website is trying to turn your camera or microphone on, it will warn you. Yes, in the same way, if the website is trying to get a 3d scan of your entire apartment, we want to warn you about that, too. And so this is the kind of balances we have to make.
Tony Morelan 41:04
So I know that is one of the big benefits around Samsung internet is all of the privacy that you get when you use Samsung internet. Nice to see how that's carrying over to web XR. how stable would you say VR is on web XR?
Ada Rose Cannon 41:22
So VR itself is very stable, VR was one of the first parts we completed in. In web XR, there's actually been VR in the web for like a long time, there was an old API called Web VR, that was deprecated. Last year, but since then, web XR, we pushed very hard to be able to totally replace Web VR with web XR with the same capabilities. So what VR is pretty stable, I doubt there'll be any more changes to it at all. So if you write something, targeting VR, yeah, lots will probably stay the same. AR is a little newer. And there are newer API's to help with augmented reality. So some of the more hit testing, depth sensing stuff, some of this is like a little newer, there may still be some privacy issues that need to be resolved, which may have some interface changes. But generally, these are also getting pretty stable. A lot of the stuff that might be arriving in the next couple of months, or have arrived in the last month or so might have a few changes. So it's important that developers do continue testing that stuff. And do keep an eye out for when the API's do change. Because occasionally, we will get feedback that some that we've developed has a major security flaw we've missed. And we can't just leave that out in the wild, we do have to change the API to fix that issue.
Tony Morelan 42:50
So are there any new features that you can share related to web standards.
Ada Rose Cannon 42:55
So there's new features being developed all the time. And the really nice thing about web standards is that the develop totally in the open. So if you want to see all the latest work that's going on, you can check out the immersive web GitHub, where you can see all of the issues that are being worked on in real time on web XR and all the related modules. There’re a few modules I'm really excited about. One, which is still super early days would be some kind of Dom layer, API that would let us put DOM content into a web XR scene. So like HTML elements, and CSS, this is like kind of a tricky thing to do. And it's something we've wanted for a long time. And I'm hoping it won't be too far in the future when we eventually get it. So what
Tony Morelan 43:42
it is, is, since I am new to web XR, myself, what is DOM content?
Ada Rose Cannon 43:47
So DOM content is like HTML and CSS content. So like, the normal stuff you'd see on a website, so like, forms, images, buttons, you know, that kind of thing? links, okay, so is this where if I am in either a VR and AR environment, this is where you can actually have like buttons that are clickable within that space? Yeah, exactly. So in addition to making your 3d environment where the user can grab stuff and pull stuff, and have 3d models, you can also have part of a web page in the environment. And that may sound quite boring, because it's just going to be like a 2d rectangle with content in it. This lets you use the heck demand CSS API's that are already available in browsers to build 2d interfaces in VR and AR as well. So for example, if you had HTML form reimplementing, that whole thing out of rectangles and shape in 3d modeling application is kind of a pain, sure, but just being able to write some HTML and take advantage of all the really powerful 2d layout capabilities of the web is just a fantastic feature and will let developers make the most out of both 3d and 2d.
Tony Morelan 45:03
Nice, nice. Yeah. So what are some other technologies that go well with web XR?
Ada Rose Cannon 45:08
So the first one that comes to mind is like web RTC. So this is what lets you do video sharing and audio sharing over the web.
Tony Morelan 45:17
In web RTC stands for real time communication, correct? It does, yes.
Ada Rose Cannon 45:21
So this lets you, for example, if a means kind of some kind of social VR situation, I could do some kind of cool between me and another person. So I can chat with them in an efficient manner that's peer to peer without needing to go up to a central service. Okay. And another thing that's really useful for social VR stuff is WebSockets. So WebSockets lets you do incredibly high bandwidth, very, very fast data connections between your client and the server. So you could have many people in a single room, or with having all their positions and rotations shared over WebSockets. So you can see people moving around and walking around in real time. And so using their free web RTC is like the kind of the two things you need to get a really good social web experience.
Tony Morelan 46:15
So what about the technology, Web Audio? How was that working with web XR?
Ada Rose Cannon 46:20
So Web Audio is a really interesting API. So web XR doesn't actually bother dealing with any audio stuff out of the box. There's not like specific information you need for working with audio. But the really powerful thing about Web Audio is that it has stuff like a 3d panner node with hrtf built in. So you can already do 3d audio in the web long before web XR came along, which is incredibly cool. So you can have correct 3d audio, using the Web Audio API using the web. And it's something that's like a little tricky to set up. There's a really great library by Google called the resonance project. And it lets you like define the surfaces around you. So you can say the floor is hard. There's no ceiling is where the walls are, and will correctly work out the echoes and the reverb. And so you could have multiple sound sources, that will sound really good. And you'll be able to know where they are instinctually? Because they're done in 3d. Wow. And this is really powerful.
Tony Morelan 47:22
Yeah, cuz I could see where if you're like moving throughout that environment, your audio is going to be changing the sound reflection from within the room to be able to experience those changes. Yeah, that seems really powerful.
Ada Rose Cannon 47:35
Yeah, so you can take the information from web XR, for example, the position of the user's head, and then you feed that into a library like resonance. And that will automatically handle the correct sound from the user's perspective, which is pretty amazing.
Tony Morelan 47:53
Yeah. So what about 5g? How is WebEx R and 5g working together?
Ada Rose Cannon 48:00
So 5g is totally amazing. And this is definitely Kevin's cup of tea. So he should answer this one.
Kevin Picchi 48:06
So 5g would essentially improve your experience using WebEx. So for example, you could have way bigger models downloaded on your phone with a higher quality, and it would simply load faster. You could also imagine having multiplayer experiences and having almost zero lag or latency.
Tony Morelan 48:29
Now, I know that you're working on 5g tours, what exactly is 5g tours.
Kevin Picchi 48:34
So 5g tour is a European project in which Samsung participates. And we test the 5g performances in different environments, in which the first one is touristic environment where we try to enhance the experience of tourists while they're visiting a city. There is another one which is the mobility one, we try to enhance the way people move in the city. And we also try to improve and create new experiences in a way that we make the city safer. So let's say there is an evacuation, we can provide guides and we basically use 5g in all of those verticals to improve them.
Tony Morelan 49:19
So to talk a little bit more about making cities more secure or safer. What exactly do you mean by that?
Kevin Picchi 49:24
So we have a use case that we're working on internally to take all of it is making evacuation easier and faster by leveraging 5g, for example, have some sort of augmented reality application lunch instantly on the phone after people in the airport and the application would basically guide the people out of the airports in a safe way. So let's say there would be a fire and you would be guided around the fire and in the right direction. Nice.
Tony Morelan 49:55
So can you tell me how is Samsung internet involved with the with 5g tours?
Kevin Picchi 49:59
Well, it's So we're working on basically three sub projects in the 5g tour, where we take advantage of web technologies. So what would those technologies be? We're using web Xi web RTC, web sockets, and web each ID. Those are the Web API that Ada just talked about. We're trying to fuse them with 5g to improve those verticals.
Tony Morelan 50:25
So tell me a little bit more what is web RTC.
Kevin Picchi 50:28
One of the use cases we're working on is making museum experience experienceable by multiple people. So the goal of it is having two or three persons in a room in a museum room with a piece of art, and being able to have them both in the room and been like letting them experience the artwork, take a look at the artwork, maybe move things around the room. And all that taking advantage of 5g, which reduces latency and people
Tony Morelan 51:01
feel better. Nice. And this is in a VR environment is what you're referring to correct?
Kevin Picchi 51:05
Yes.
Tony Morelan 51:06
So what about web h ID, which I think stands for human interface device? Is that correct?
Kevin Picchi 51:12
Yes. That's kind of like the GamePad API in a way that this API lets us send probe packets to the devices. So to put it in a simple way, let's say you'd have a remote controller that is not compatible with the GamePad API, you could use this API to basically send bro comments to a controller. And you could have some kind of communication going. And we're using that API with the remote controller that we're using in another use case, in which were basically communicating with remote and getting sensors data. And we're using them as a controller basically.
Tony Morelan 51:59
Nice, nice to see the versatility of it. Is there any news coming out that you can share that's related to WebEx R and Samsung internet?
Ada Rose Cannon 52:08
web XR is evolving really quickly. The best way to keep up to date with new news and events. And all the cool stuff that's happening in web XR is to subscribe to the immersive web weekly newsletter. It's a newsletter that comes out on Tuesdays and is a really great way to stay up to date with everything that's happening in the immersive web world
Tony Morelan 52:26
nicely. And we'll include a link to that newsletter in the in the show notes. What advice do you have for developers looking to start building for Samsung internet and in WebEx are?
Ada Rose Cannon 52:39
Probably my best advice is to find an environment you're happy working with. I really like a frame, there's quite a few out there, I have a few Getting Started guides on a website I maintain called immersive web dot Dev. So it's a great place to look at the different ways you can try out building web XR. There's also some really useful tools out there, such as an emulator that lets you emulate immersive headsets in the web browser. So you can test your site without needing to actually put on a headset, which is a really great way just to like experiment with stuff as you're building it and is a tool that I use an awful lot. Right. So that's great to hear.
Tony Morelan 53:18
So are there other ways for developers to follow you and learn more about by what you have to offer?
Kevin Picchi 53:23
Yes, surely. We're mostly active on Twitter at Samsung internet. And you can also find our blog and our Samsung internet page on the developer samsung.com slash internet website. You can also follow us here and I on Twitter. My ad is Kevin peaky. P ICC h II.
Ada Rose Cannon 53:46
And mine is at Ada rose cannon.
Tony Morelan 53:49
Well, even Kevin, it was great to have you on the podcast just wanted to say thanks for giving us a little insight into Samsung internet and web XR.
Ada Rose Cannon 53:57
Thank you so much for having us. It's been really good.
Kevin Picchi 53:59
Yeah. Thanks for having us sunny.
Dan Appelquist 54:03
Yeah, so good to hear about what we're doing with web XR and the immersive web I it's a technology that I think is really game changing, especially in the way that it democratizes Xu, democratizes, AR and VR and really brings the value of that technology to more people across different types of handsets different types of devices. It's really, it's so important. We've talked a lot about different aspects of Samsung internet, what would be the best way for developers to even learn more? Well, you can first of all, visit us on our homepage, which is developer.Samsung.com/internet or you can just click on Samsung internet once you go to developer.Samsung.com. There you can read about our latest releases, you can read about the team. You can have links to all our social media. We are Samsung internet on Twitter, our DMS are open there and now account is managed by our team directly. So if you're DM’ing, Samsung internet, the entire team here will read it. And we will try to get back to you. But also, if you have bugs or if you have problems, you can use that as a great channel to reach us. Or you can just add mention us on Twitter, and we'll be happy to have a conversation with you there. We're also on LinkedIn, if you search for us on LinkedIn, Samsung internet, you'll find our LinkedIn page and we're happy to interact there as well. We're on medium. If you search for Samsung internet, again, that's linked from our page at developer.samsung.com/internet. We blog on medium and we also reflect that blog on developer.samsung.com so that you can see us everywhere you go. Hey, Dan, it was great to have you on the podcast. Just wanted to say thanks to you and your team, for all the great and exciting things that are coming with Samsung internet. Thanks for the opportunity. And thank you for all the work that you've put in.
Closing 55:59
Looking to start creating for Samsung. Download the latest tools to code your next app, or get software for designing apps without coding at all. Sell your apps to the world on the Samsung Galaxy store. Check out developer.samsung.com today and start your journey with Samsung.
The POW! podcast is brought to you by the Samsung Developer Program and produced by Tony Morelan.
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