Intent to Implement: WebXR plane detection API

[bia...@chromium.org]

Contact emails bia...@chromium.org Explainer https://github.com/immersive-web/real-world-geometry/blob/master/plane-detection-explainer.md Design docs/spec https://github.com/immersive-web/real-world-geometry/blob/master/plane-detection-explainer.md TAG review Summary The feature allows WebXR applications to retrieve data about planes present in the user’s environment. This enables AR applications to create a more immersive experiences leveraging obtained information. Motivation Without the proposed feature, developers would have to resort to running their own computer vision algorithms on data from getUserMedia() in order to detect planes present in the user’s environment. Such solutions have thus far been unable to match the quality and accuracy of native AR capabilities or support world scale. Risks

Interoperability and Compatibility This is an incubation of a small extension to WebXR within the Immersive Web CG. Support for AR in WebXR is less mature than VR, so we do not expect any interoperability or compatibility issues other than with other potential experiments. The learnings from this implementation will help inform WebXR support for AR. Firefox: No public signals Edge: No public signals Safari: No public signals Web developers: No signals Ergonomics The feature will be presented as a part of WebXR Device API. The feature will be most likely used in tandem with WebGL. The current API shape involves providing all plane information to the renderer process for each frame. The amount of data is minimal, but this is something we will keep an eye on during implementation and experimentation. Activation As this feature builds on the WebXR Device API, which is still under development, progress depends on the continuing maturity and enabling of that API. In addition, this feature also depends on still to be defined AR capabilities of WebXR. That said, developers have shown a willingness to experiment with early AR capabilities. Although similar capabilities can be implemented in user space using computer vision algorithms on data from getUserMedia(), it is not possible to implement a drop-in polyfill that provides the same world-scale capabilities. It is likely that developers will access and/or use this capability through other libraries such as three.js and <model-viewer>.

Will this feature be supported on all six Blink platforms (Windows, Mac, Linux, Chrome OS, Android, and Android WebView)? No This feature relies on AR support in the platform. The initial focus is on Android devices that support ARCore. Is this feature fully tested by web-platform-tests? No Tests will be added to WebXR's WPT suite. Link to entry on the Chrome Platform Status https://www.chromestatus.com/features/5732397976911872