Rendering custom controls: do I have to use a PPAPI plugin?

[kheimon]

I am considering CEF as an alternative to other UI/front-end frameworks. However, my application has peculiar needs in terms of UI: I still need to render native controls, that I could migrate to HTML5 eventually, but this is not an option at the moment.

What would be the most reasonable way to do it, if any? How about implementing a PPAPI plugin? Could it be partially transparent and have HTML DOM objects overlaying on top of it? Given it would run it a separate process, how would you manage IPC with the main (wrapper) process?

I am aware this is a very broad discussion topic, but I am here to gather your opinions and, possibly, be pointed to the right direction that could be not the one I am heading to.

[magreenblatt]

How complex are the UI controls in question? You might be better off converting them to HTML/CSS/JS now instead of spending a lot of effort trying to get the existing native controls working in a browser.

[kheimon]

They are complex widgets, rendering live videos and/or elaborated graphics. It is a huge effort to port them now and a possible deal breaker for CEF.

[magreenblatt]

They are complex widgets, rendering live videos and/or elaborated graphics. It is a huge effort to port them now and a possible deal breaker for CEF.

Performant video rendering requires access to hardware APIs that are disallowed by the PPAPI sandbox. See here for your options: viewtopic.php?f=10&t=11304

[kheimon]

This really helpful even though it is essentially a tombstone.

I guess there is no way for me to tamper with CEF in order to get some sort of overlay-able rectangle having a native HWND.

Thanks!