ScreenCast

Description

Screen cast portal backend interface

The Screen cast portal allows to create screen cast sessions.

This documentation describes version 5 of this interface.

Properties

org.freedesktop.impl.portal.ScreenCast:AvailableSourceTypes

AvailableSourceTypes readable u

A bitmask of available source types. Currently defined types are:

  • 1: MONITOR: Share existing monitors

  • 2: WINDOW: Share application windows

  • 4: VIRTUAL: Extend with new virtual monitor

org.freedesktop.impl.portal.ScreenCast:AvailableCursorModes

AvailableCursorModes readable u

Available cursor mode values:

  • 1: Hidden. The cursor is not part of the screen cast stream.

  • 2: Embedded: The cursor is embedded as part of the stream buffers.

  • 4: Metadata: The cursor is not part of the screen cast stream, but sent as PipeWire stream metadata.

org.freedesktop.impl.portal.ScreenCast:version

version readable u

Methods

org.freedesktop.impl.portal.ScreenCast.CreateSession

CreateSession (
  IN handle o,
  IN session_handle o,
  IN app_id s,
  IN options a{sv},
  OUT response u,
  OUT results a{sv}
)

Create a screen cast session.

The following results get returned in the results vardict:

  • session_id (s)

    The session id. A string representing the created screen cast session.

handle

Object path for the Request object representing this call

session_handle

Object path for the Session object representing the session being created

app_id

App id of the application

options

Vardict with optional further information

response

Numeric response

results

Vardict with the results of the call

org.freedesktop.impl.portal.ScreenCast.SelectSources

SelectSources (
  IN handle o,
  IN session_handle o,
  IN app_id s,
  IN options a{sv},
  OUT response u,
  OUT results a{sv}
)

Configure what the screen cast session should record.

Supported keys in the options vardict include:

  • types (u)

    Bitmask of what type of content to record. Default is MONITOR.

  • multiple (b)

    Whether to allow selecting multiple sources. Default is no.

  • cursor_mode (u)

    Determines how the cursor will be drawn in the screen cast stream. It must be one of the cursor modes advertised in #org.freedesktop.portal.impl.ScreenCast.AvailableCursorModes. Setting a cursor mode not advertised will cause the screen cast session to be closed. The default cursor mode is ‘Hidden’.

    This option was added in version 2 of this interface.

  • restore_data ((suv))

    The data to restore from a previous session.

    If the stored session cannot be restored, this value is ignored and the user will be prompted normally. This may happen when, for example, the session contains a monitor or a window that is not available anymore, or when the stored permissions are withdrawn.

    The restore data is composed of the vendor name (e.g. “GNOME” or “KDE”), the version of the implementation-specific private data, and the implementation-specific private data itself.

    This option was added in version 4 of this interface.

  • persist_mode (u)

    How this session should persist. Default is 0. Accepted values are:

    • 0: Do not persist (default)

    • 1: Permissions persist as long as the application is running

    • 2: Permissions persist until explicitly revoked

    If the permission for the session to persist is granted, “persist_mode” will be returned in the results of the org.freedesktop.impl.portal.ScreenCast.Start method.

    This option was added in version 4 of this interface.

For available source types, see the AvailableSourceTypes property.

handle

Object path for the Request object representing this call

session_handle

Object path for the Session object representing the session

app_id

App id of the application

options

Vardict with optional further information

response

Numeric response

results

Vardict with the results of the call

org.freedesktop.impl.portal.ScreenCast.Start

Start (
  IN handle o,
  IN session_handle o,
  IN app_id s,
  IN parent_window s,
  IN options a{sv},
  OUT response u,
  OUT results a{sv}
)

Start the screen cast session. This will typically result the portal presenting a dialog letting the user do the selection set up by SelectSources.

The following results get returned in the results vardict:

  • streams (a(ua{sv}))

    An array of PipeWire streams. Each stream consists of a PipeWire node ID (the first element in the tuple, and a Vardict of properties.

    The array will contain a single stream if ‘multiple’ (see SelectSources) was set to ‘false’, or at least one stream if ‘multiple’ was set to ‘true’ as part of the SelectSources method.

    Each stream constains the following properties:

    • position ((ii))

      A tuple consisting of the position (x, y) in the compositor coordinate space. Note that the position may not be equivalent to a position in a pixel coordinate space. Only available for monitor streams.

    • size ((ii))

      A tuple consisting of (width, height). The size represents the size of the stream as it is displayed in the compositor coordinate space. Note that this size may not be equivalent to a size in a pixel coordinate space. The size may differ from the size of the stream.

    • source_type (u)

      The type of the content which is being screen casted. For available source types, see the AvailableSourceTypes property.

      This property was added in version 3 of this interface.

    • mapping_id (s)

      An optional identifier used to map different aspects of the resource this stream corresponds to.

      When used in a remote desktop session, the mapping_id can be used to match a libei region of absolute libei devices. There may be multiple absolute libei devices, and each device may have multiple regions, but a mapping_id will only match one of these regions per device.

      This property was added in version 5 of this interface.

  • persist_mode (u)

    Portal implementations can optionally offer ways to “reduce” the persist mode, for example by explicitly asking the user. See the ‘persist_mode’ option of SelectSources for a list of possible values.

    If no persist mode is returned by the Start request, it is assumed to be the same persist mode received during SelectSources.

    This option was added in version 4 of this interface.

  • restore_data ((suv))

    The data to be restored. This is the data that a portal implementation sent in reaction to transient or persistent modes.

    This data will be stored in the permission store if the effective persist mode is 2, and may be passed in the future as part of the SelectSources() method call. The portal backend should store enough information in ‘restore_data’ to be able to restore the session later. The portal backend can deal with unavailable sources however they see fit.

    Data generated by a portal implementation must be consumable by the same portal implementation, but not necessarily by others. Thus, it is important to properly handle ‘restore_data’ not being in a valid format. This may happen when, e.g., the user switched to another desktop environment, or is using a different portal implementation.

    This response option was added in version 4 of this interface.

handle

Object path for the Request object representing this call

session_handle

Object path for the Session object representing the session

app_id

App id of the application

parent_window

Identifier for the application window, see Window Identifiers

options

Vardict with optional further information

response

Numeric response

results

Vardict with the results of the call