Roku OS developer release notes

Join the Roku beta program to implement new features in the latest Roku OS before the general release.

Roku OS 15.1

Roku OS 15.1 includes support for app tracing with Perfetto, new media playback and content metadata features, and a deprecated API.

Here is the list of key developer-facing Roku OS 15.1 updates:

Media playback and content metadata

New seek mode based on HLS Manifest

The Video.seekMode field supports a new “manifest” mode that seeks to the start offset time specified in the EXT-X-START tag of the HLS manifest.

Developer and debugging tools

Perfetto app tracing

You can use Perfetto to record, analyze, and visualize traces of your Roku apps to pinpoint where you can reduce resource consumption and optimize performance. Tracing captures and visualizes the events in your app on a timeline, which provides you with a detailed graphical view of what your app is doing over time.

With Roku ECP and a Websocket client, you can launch your app, record and save a trace, and then open it in Perfetto. You can then explore the trace in Perfetto by using the WASD keys on your keyboard to zoom and pan, and your mouse to expand process tracks (rows) into their constituent thread tracks. You can also execute SQL-based queries in Perfetto.

For more information on using Perfetto to trace your Roku apps, click here.

Deprecations

roString.AppendString(s as String, len as Integer) as Void

This function has been deprecated. Use the SetString() function instead.

Roku OS 15.0

Roku OS 15.0 features major BrightScript updates, including new APIs for transferring node data and handling references, improved JSON parsing with reduced memory overhead, and more robust functions for getting the system uptime and date/time.

In addition, this release includes new media playback and content metadata features and enhancements to the Roku Resource Monitor.

Here is the list of key developer-facing Roku OS 15.0 updates:

BrightScript APIs

Optimized data transfer and reference handling APIs

This release features a set of new APIs for transferring node data more efficiently than copying. These APIs let you move data in and out of fields, access data by reference, and queue the messages to be consumed by handlers on the render thread. This improves app performance by minimizing memory consumption, especially for handling larger objects.

Click here for detailed information on using these APIs.

roArray.ifArraySizeInfo()

The new ifArraySizeInfo() interface includes set of functions that provide developers with more control over array capacities. These functions reduce the memory overhead when using the ParseJSON() function on large JSON body data sets.

IsResizable() As Boolean

Returns a flag indicating whether the array will automatically expand to store new items.

Capacity() As Integer

Returns the current storage capacity of the array (specifically, how many items could be stored without allocating additional storage).

The return value may be 0 if the array is empty and no storage has been allocated yet.

Reserve(minSize As Integer)

Sends a request to allocate or increase storage capacity of the array to hold at least the specified number of items.

Returns true if the potential capacity update can hold the specified number of items. Otherwise, returns false if the array is not resizable or storage allocation fails.

The updated capacity of the array may be more than was requested if the extra capacity already existed or how storage was implemented.

ShrinkToFit() As Boolean

Request to free or decrease storage to the minimum needed to store the current number of items.

Returns true unless the array is not resizable or storage reallocation fails.

The updated capacity of the array may be more than the exact number of items in it based on the storage implementation.

roDeviceInfo.GetUptimeMillisecondsAsLong() as Long

The GetUptimeMillisecondsAsLong() function returns the system's uptime since the last reboot (in milliseconds as a Long). This function is similar to the global utility Uptime function, but makes it easier for developers to handle monotonic milliseconds.

roDateTime.AsMillisecondsLong() as Long

The roDateTime.AsMillisecondsLong() function returns a Long representing the date/time as the number of milliseconds from the Unix epoch (00:00:00 1/1/1970 GMT).

Media playback and content metadata

Widevine license wrapping - license challenge URL support

The contentNode.drmParams.requestField, which was introduced in Roku OS 14.6, now supports the LICENSE_CHALLENGE field being provided as a URL (in addition to a text string). The Roku OS automatically follows the challenge URLs properly.

roDeviceInfo.IsAutoAdjustRefreshRateEnabled()

The roDeviceInfo.IsAutoAdjustRefreshRateEnabled() function checks whether the Auto Adjust Display Refresh Rate setting is enabled on a device.

Developer and debugging tools

ECP commands for checking CEC settings on Roku streaming players

Developers can now use ECP to check whether CEC settings (TV power and volume control) have been enabled on a Roku streaming player.

The query-device-info command now returns the following fields that indicate whether TV power and audio volume control have been enabled on a player:

  • supports-tv-power-control
  • supports-audio-volume-control
Roku Resource Monitor 4.2

Roku Resource Monitor 4.2 features a new Data Collection Mode that enables developers to integrate a headless version of the tool into their CLI pipelines. This provides developers with automated data collection and performance monitoring without having to use the RRM UI. The collected data can be used to detect memory leaks, analyze resource utilization trends, and debug issues.

Roku OS 14.6

Roku OS 14.6 includes BrightScript updates, new media playback and content metadata features, and enhancements to the Roku Resource Monitor and debugging tools. Here is the list of key developer-facing Roku OS 14.6 updates:

BrightScript APIs

ParseJson() support for double precision numbers

The parseJson() function includes a new “d” flag that changes floating point number parsing to use double-precision floating point values (roDouble), when needed, to improve the precision of the parsed numbers. This helps developers handle JSON payloads from server-side ad insertion (SSAI) providers that use floating-point values to represent time values.

Media playback and content metadata

Widevine license wrapping

The contentNode.drmParams field includes four new parameters that enable developers to wrap the Widevine license challenge payload in the request format (JSON or XML) required by their license server proxy:

Developer and debugging tools

Roku Resource Monitor 4.1

Roku Resource Monitor 4.1 (RRM 4.1) improves scrollbar behavior and provides additional support for large session files. The SceneGraph nodes panel now includes shallow memory usage summaries, and the BrightScript objects panel now includes object counts and memory usage per thread.

Cross-component backtrace in debug console and debug protocol

The debug console and debug protocol both now include cross-component backtraces. This means that you can now navigate and inspect function context frames from different SceneGraph components, instead of just from the active component, if the call chain includes observer callbacks or functions called via callFunc

For example, if roSgNode A calls into roSgNode B on the same thread (for example, via CallFunc) and then B breaks into the call, you can now view the calls belonging to both A and B in the backtrace of the thread.

Debug console

You can use the existing backtrace, up, down, over, and out commands in the debug console on stack frames entered via callFunc or an observer callback, in addition to a normal BrightScript function call.

Debug protocol

You can now use the STEP command in the BrightScript debug protocol to step over and out of SceneGraph observer callbacks and functions called via callFunc.

Deprecations

Blowfish ciphers

Blowfish (bf*) ciphers are now marked as obsolete in the roEVPCipher document. Support for these ciphers may be removed in future Roku OS releases.

Roku OS 14.5

Roku OS 14.5 includes major updates to Roku Developer Tools, including the Roku Resource Monitor and BrightScript Profiler. Here is the list of key developer-facing Roku OS 14.5 updates:

Roku Developer Tools

Essential updates have been made to the following Roku Developer Tools to ensure compatibility and reliability across modern platforms:

  • Roku Advanced Layout Editor
  • Roku Remote Tool
  • Roku DeepLinking Tester
  • Roku Stream Tester

This release provides the following improvements, critical bug fixes, and updates to the dependency stack to improve support for current and upcoming operating systems:

  • Updated dependencies: All major libraries and components have been upgraded to support the latest macOS (incl. Sequoia), Linux, and Windows 11 environments.
  • Signed macOS build: Package signing has been updated so tools now launch without warnings on MacOS systems.
  • Improved cross-platform support: Enhanced performance and system integration across macOS, Linux distributions, and Windows.
  • Bug fixes: Resolved various issues and improved user experience.
Roku Resource Monitor 4.0

Roku Resource Monitor 4.0 (RRM 4.0) introduces several UI enhancements, including the ability to disable specific metric panels for your channel. This feature stops monitoring and hides the selected metric, allowing for a more streamlined and customized monitoring experience. Additionally, RRM 4.0 automatically saves your view configuration, ensuring your preferred layout is retained the next time you launch the tool.

RRM 4.0 also consolidates the BrightScript Objects panels into one graph and adds an option for displaying the memory used by different objects, breaks out the SceneGraph metrics into the different node types (similar to the BrightScript Objects panel), and lets you drill down into the source code associated with a rendezvous event.

BrightScript Profiler

The BrightScript Profiler features improved performance and stability. The tool uses less CPU and memory resources; therefore, it stays performant as you use it for longer sessions or switch tabs during a session.

Media playback and content metadata

The drmParams parameter now includes an ignoreInitDataPssh control attribute that ignores the PSSH in the initialization segment. This enables support for Harmonic/DTV-GO DASH-IOP v5.0.0 streams with In-Band Key-Rotation Signaling without breaking legacy streams/apps that do not provide the <ContentProtection> element with PSSH info in the DASH manifest.

Roku SceneGraph (RSG) 1.1 apps sunset

Support for apps using SceneGraph 1.1 (RSG 1.1) has ended on Roku OS 14.5. Apps claiming "rsg_version=1.1" in the manifest file will execute as if rsg_version=1.2 was specified and therefore may stop functioning properly on Roku OS 14.5. Developers must migrate their RSG 1.1 apps to RSG 1.2 to ensure they run on Roku OS 14.5.

In the Roku OS 9.0 release, the eval() function was deprecated and developers were instructed to use RSG 1.2 by setting the rsg_version flag in their manifest file to “rsg_version=1.2” in order to optimize load time performance and memory usage. In the Roku OS 9.3 release, the eval() function was sunset and it was noted that developers had to either remove all usage of the eval() function or update the rsg_version flag to “rsgversion=1.1”. With the release of Roku OS 14.5, the "rsg_version=1.1" manifest value is no longer an option and will be ignored.

Roku OS 14.0

Initial rollout date: September 24, 2024

Roku OS 14.0 includes new SceneGraph features for displaying monospaced text in your apps. Developers can use the new MonospaceLabel node to draw a single line of text with all characters spaced at a fixed distance from each other. This functions as an alternative to using a monospace font with the Label node. In addition, the LabelBase node includes a new monospacedDigits field that enables the rendering of tabular digits in overhang time values and countdowns.

In addition, Roku OS 14.0 includes features that enhance the performance of media playback and Roku devices in general and expand platform support for industry standards covering content metadata.

Here is the list of key developer-facing Roku OS 14.0 updates:

  • MonospaceLabel — The MonospaceLabel node is used to draw a single line of text with all characters spaced at a fixed distance from each other. It transforms proportional fonts into monospaced fonts. It is a substitute for using a monospace font with the Label node.
  • LabelBase.monospacedDigits — The LabelBase.monospacedDigits field is used to render monospaced digits.

Roku OS 13.0

Initial rollout date: April 10, 2024

Roku OS 13.0 includes a new contentClassifier content metadata attribute that lets developers optimize the sound and picture on Roku TVs based on different content genres. This helps developers increase app engagement by giving customers a simple, convenient way to optimize their playback experience. Other media enhancements include new Video node attributes that provide developers with accessibility information about audio and subtitle tracks.

New BrightScript APIs help developers monitor and debug memory issues. The roAppMemoryMontor node includes a new function that returns the maximum amount of background and foreground memory an app may use, and the roAppManager node includes a function that lists the reason an app was terminated. In addition, this release includes new APIs that let developers check whether autoplay is enabled on a device and whether the system clock is valid.

For tools, ECP includes new exit-app and query-app-state commands that help developers automate the testing of apps that support Instant Resume and a new query/app-object-counts command that helps developers associate memory and CPU usage with changes in BrightScript node object counts in their apps.

Here is the list of key developer-facing Roku OS 13.0 updates:

BrightScript APIs

  • Maximum available memory query — The roAppMemoryMonitor component includes a new GetChannelMemoryLimit () function that returns how much foreground and background memory the app may use and the maximum amount of memory that the RokuOS may allocate on behalf of the app (the memory that shows up in the app's heap memory statistics ). This helps developers debug memory issues and find out the maximum available memory for scenarios such as when their app has been suspended and is in the background, is playing a video, and so on.
  • App exit query — The roAppManager component includes a new GetLastExitInfo() function that returns an exit code indicating why an app was terminated. This helps developers monitor and debug memory issues with their apps. The last exit information is provided for only the 10 most recent exits across all apps, and exit information does not persist across device reboots.
  • Autoplay-enabled query — The roDeviceInfo component includes a new IsAutoplayEnabled() function that lets developers check whether autoplay is enabled on a device. This lets developers ensure that their apps respect this device setting when customers browse content in their app.

Media, DRM, and content metadata updates

  • Seamless audio track selection — The Video node includes a new seamlessAudioTrackSelection field that enables apps to continuously play video content when the audio track is switched (provided that the audio format remains the same). This gives developers the choice when the audio track is changed to either pause the video for approximately 1 second (current default behavior) or continue video playback. This feature currently supports HLS only.

Tools

New ECP commands

Developers can leverage the following ECP new commands in their tools and web services:

Deprecated APIs

Roku OS 12.5

Initial rollout date: September 12, 2023

Roku OS 12.5 includes new APIs for monitoring the current amount of available memory for an app and getting the device user agent. This release also includes features that generally enhance the performance of media playback such as prebuffering for live content, improved closed captioning through ad breaks, and pre-playback audio and subtitle track selection.

Here is the list of key developer-facing Roku OS 12.5 updates:

BrightScript APIs

  • Available memory query — The roAppMemoryMonitor node includes a new GetChannelAvailableMemory() function that provides developers with the estimated kilobytes (Kb) of memory available for their app. This helps developers identify when to release memory when their app receives low-memory warnings.
  • Device user agent — The roUrlTransfer node includes a new GetUserAgent() function that returns the device user agent. This provides developers with a direct method for getting the user agent in order to pass it into server-side ad requests.

Media, DRM, and content metadata updates

  • Prebuffering for live content — Roku's media player now includes support for prebuffering live content. For video-on-demand (VOD) content, the media player now requires less data to be prebuffered.
  • Improved support for maintaining closed captioning through ad breaks — If the start-time of a video ad occurs between the buffering and closed captioning start times, Roku's media player now maintains the closed captioning information. This helps recover any close caption sentences that may be missed after an ad break finishes. This is particularly useful for CEA 608/708 caption formatting because caption data is received from video content before ad breaks.
  • Representation filtering based on HDCP level — When a 4K-capable Roku device is connected to an HD display, the Roku media player now filters out 4K representations to prevent DRM-based decryption failures.

Deprecated APIs

  • run_as_process manifest attribute has been deprecated — All apps now run in a separate process, regardless if the run_as_process attribute has been specified in the manifest.

Roku OS 12.0

Initial rollout date: March 8, 2023

Roku OS 12.0 includes a new BrightScript API for getting localized times and Instant Resume support for apps that do not have exit confirmation dialogs. For tools, this release features new External Control Protocol (ECP) query commands, and it enables developers using the BrightScript Debug Protocol to add breakpoints while the script is running.

Here is the list of key developer-facing Roku OS 12.0 updates:

BrightScript APIs

Integrations

Tools

  • New ECP commands — ECP includes a new query/graphic-frame-rate command that gets the graphics rendering frame rate, and app and media events can now be now tracked via a set of new query/fwbeacons commands (fwbeacons/track, fwbeacons/untrack and query/fwbeacons).

    In addition, calling the query/registry ECP command now returns a new space-available field that provides developers with the amount of storage currently available in the device's registry, and the query/sgnodes command now returns a tree structure representing the app's UI, rather than a flat list of nodes.

    Developers can leverage these commands in their tools and web services.

  • BrightScript debug protocol (version 3.2) — The BrightScript debug protocol now supports ADD_CONDITIONAL_BREAKPOINTS requests while the script is running. When this occurs, the breakpoints are registered, queued, and then applied as soon as processing allows. This eliminates the need to wait for the script to be paused in order to apply breakpoints. Instead, the breakpoints can now be applied based on the current device state. Developers should now use the ADD_CONDITIONAL_BREAKPOINTS command instead of ADD_BREAKPOINTS because ADD_CONDITIONAL_BREAKPOINTS is a strict superset of ADD_BREAKPOINTS.

Roku OS 11.5

Initial rollout date: September 12, 2022

Roku OS 11.5 includes new SceneGraph Video and Content node fields that enhance the trickplay and pause screen experiences during video playback. This release also adds device attestation tokens that developers can incorporate in their web services to verify that messages originated from authentic Roku devices.

In addition, Roku OS 11.5 includes features that enhance the performance of media playback and Roku devices in general and expand platform support for industry standards covering content metadata.

For tools, this release features the Roku Resource Monitor: a new developer tool that tracks and visualizes the system memory, graphics memory, CPU, and SceneGraph nodes used by an app. Developers can use this tool to test the different screens in their app and identify consumption trends and patterns. In addition, this release includes new External Control Protocol (ECP) query commands that return rendezvous events and the entries in the device registry. Developers can incorporate these new queries in their test labs for debugging and performance monitoring. The BrightScript Debug Protocol now includes events for conditional breakpoints, compile errors in the main application and in component libraries, and improved breakpoint support for component libraries.

It is important to note that Roku OS 11.5 sunsets the SDK1 visual screen components that were originally deprecated in 2017; these components have been completely removed from the Roku OS. In addition, the roUrlTransfer.enableFreshConnection() function has been deprecated—apps should always reuse connections.

Here is the list of key developer-facing Roku OS 11.5 updates:

SceneGraph APIs

  • Playback UX — Roku's SceneGraph Video and Content nodes include new fields that enable developers to integrate playback features for the trickplay and pause screen experiences such as audio and subtitle selection, playlist features such as skip, next, and queues, and autoplay recommendation features such "More like this"/"Because you watched". Customers have become accustomed to this playback experience on The Roku Channel, and it is now available to apps across the platform.

  • Content.secondaryTitle. Adds a secondary title for the video content. This field can be used to display the release year of movies, for example.

  • Video.playbackActionButtons. Shows the buttons and other specified UI elements on the pause screen at the start of playback. This field includes properties for the button text, icon, and status (enabled/disabled). Related fields identify which pause screen button is selected and has key focus, and sets the button color, text color, and background color based on whether the button has key focus.

  • Video.pivotNode. Adds a generic renderable node that can be used to display any SceneGraph component.

  • Video.trickPlayBackgroundOverlay. Specifies the background overlay to be displayed whenever the playback UI is visible during the video playback experience.

  • Option to disable focus animations in ArrayGrid nodes — Developers can use the new ArrayGrid.skipFocusAnimations field to completely disable animations on ArrayGrid child nodes such as the MarkupGrid and MarkupList components. For apps implementing custom focus logic, this field can be used to eliminate the reported ~300ms period in which no component has focus after a keypress.
  • Device attestation token — Developers can use the new ChannelStore getDeviceAttestationToken command to generate a signed JSON web token (JWT) in the Roku cloud and return it to the application. This token can then be passed to the publisher's web services to verify that messages originated from genuine Roku devices. A getDeviceAttestation() function has also been added to roChannelStore component. This token is meant to replace the functionality previously provided by the device client certificates.

BrightScript APIs

  • Continue statements — Developers can now insert continue statements in for and while loops. This terminates the execution of the statements in the current iteration of the loop, and then continues execution of the loop with the next iteration.

Tools

  • Roku Resource Monitor — The Roku Resource Monitor tracks and visualizes the system memory, graphics memory, CPU, and SceneGraph nodes used by an app. This enables developers to test the different screens in their app and identify consumption trends and patterns. This new developer tool is intended to be used in conjunction with the BrightScript Profiler to improve app performance. For example, if the Roku Resource Monitor consistently shows increased consumption with a specific action on a screen, developers can use the BrightScript Profiler to further drill down into the application and pinpoint where to optimize the code.
  • New ECP query commands for performance monitoring and debugging apps — Developers can use the following new ECP query commands to monitor the performance of their apps and debug the apps: query/sgrendezvous and query/registry. These queries return rendezvous events and the entries in the device registry, respectively. Developers can leverage these commands, which were previously only available via the debug console, in their tools and web services.

  • Enhanced ECP query commands — The following ECP commands have been improved for the Roku OS 11.5 release:

    • query/r2d2-bitmaps. This command now returns the file name for any asset in texture memory that cannot be attributed directly to a plug-in. In Roku OS 11.0, assets that could not be associated with a plug-in were omitted from the response.

    • query/sgnodes. This command can now be called with a specific channel-id, which enables it to be used on background apps. The response now includes a node-count field.

  • BrightScript debug protocol updates — The BrightScript debug protocol (version 3.1) now includes events for compile errors in the main application and in component libraries, conditional breakpoints, and improved breakpoint support for component libraries.
  • Improved app compression from Development Application Installer — The default compression algorithm in the Development Application installer has been changed to squashfs (zstd) from gzip for sideloaded apps. In addition, the conversion option squashfs (gzip) has been changed to gzip. This generally reduces the package file size.

Architecture

  • Fonts — The system fonts have been updated to provide better support for monospaced numerals. As a result, the width of characters may have changed slightly. Developers should make sure to leave space for text to expand or collapse some percentage in their app UI. Developers should not rely on exact font metrics to avoid Label nodes from being truncated or multi-line labels having varied line wrapping.

Deprecated/Sunset APIs

Roku OS 11.0

Initial rollout date: March 22, 2022

Roku OS 11.0 features new SceneGraph standard dialog framework components for adding multi-style text, images/notes, and button and checkbox icons to custom dialogs; BrightScript optional chaining operators for efficiently accessing possible undefined values; and ChannelStore APIs for displaying a customer's information in the Request for Information (RFI) sign-up screen. Developers of authenticated free and advertising-based video on demand (AVOD) apps can now display the RFI screen without having to first enroll in the Roku Partner Payouts Program.

In addition, Roku OS 11.0 improves trick play for live linear streams, and it includes features that enhance the performance of media playback and Roku devices in general and expand platform support for industry standards covering content metadata.

For tools, this release adds new External Control Protocol (ECP) query commands for debugging apps that developers can incorporate in their web services and then leverage in their test suite, and minor updates to the BrightScript debug protocol.

Below is a list of key developer-facing Roku OS 11.0 updates:

SceneGraph APIs

  • New standard dialog framework nodes — Roku's Standard Dialog Framework includes the following new nodes that enable developers to decorate or annotate custom dialogs and highlight the grouping of radio button and checkbox options in them:

    • StdDlgMultiStyleTextItem. A line of text with multiple styles in the content area of a custom dialog. The text may include, for example, plain and bold characters, different fonts, multiple colors, and/or emojis.

    • StdDlgSideCardArea. A freeform area on the right or left side of a custom dialog that developers can use to display images or notes.

    • StdDlgActionCardItem. Highlighting for the child items in the content area of a custom dialog. This node enables developers to add a "more info" arrow icon, radio button icon, or check box icon to the items in the content area.

    • StdDlgItemGroup. Visual grouping for a set of StdDlgAreaBase child nodes in a custom dialog. Developers can use this node to reduce the vertical spacing between the StdDlgItemBase child nodes in the dialog.

  • Option for Label and TextEditBox nodes to display the end of overflowing text — The Label and TextEditBox nodes now include a leadingEllipsis flag that enables developers to specify whether to show the end or beginning of text that overflows its available width. When this flag is set to true, the end of the text is shown. For example, "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" would be truncated to "...jumps over the lazy dog". When the flag is false, the start of the text is shown ("the quick brown fox jumps...").

BrightScript APIs

  • BrightScript optional chaining operators — Developers can use optional chaining operators, "?.", "?@", "?[", and "?(", in their BrightScript code to access possibly invalid values. This enables developers to execute more concise, higher-performing code. The optional chaining operators are used to read the value of a property nested within a chain of connected objects without having to first check whether each reference in the chain does not return the BrightScript value of "invalid". If testing a reference results in "invalid", the expression short-circuits and returns "invalid".
  • Tagging of unused variables — Developers can now explicitly mark variables as unused in their BrightScript code by prepending an underscore to the value (for example, sub myTask(_x)). This enables developers to avoid compilation errors when the unused variable has a valid purpose.

Roku Pay APIs

  • RFI sign-up screen option to display requested customer information — The ChannelStore.requestedUserDataInfo associative array now includes an optional forceShowData flag. When this flag is enabled, the RFI sign-up screen displays the actual customer information values to be shared with the app instead of just the types of information. For example, if the email address, first name, and last name are requested for sign-ups and the forceShowData flag is enabled, the "Let's create your account" RFI screen explicitly lists the customer's actual email address and name in bold text (for example, Bob Smith, bsmith@roku.com). If this flag is disabled and the customer is in the United States, the RFI screen displays "share your name and email address".
  • Direct access to RFI screen for authenticated free and AVOD apps — Developers of authenticated free and AVOD apps can now use the ChannelStore getUserData and getPartialUserData APIs to display an RFI screen when customers sign up or sign in to the app—without having to first enroll in the Roku Partner Payouts Program. In this case, the RFI sign-up screen can request or display the customer's email address, phone number, and zip code; the RFI sign-in screen can request or display the customer's email address and phone number.

Media, DRM, and content metadata updates

  • Improved trick play for live linear streams — The Video node includes the following new fields to help developers improve the user experience for trick play during live linear streams:

    • A trickplay.liveFilledBarBlendColor field that lets developers specify the color for the trick play progress bar during live linear streams. This color is blended with the filledBarImageUri.

    • An enableLiveAvailabilityWindow field that lets developers enable scrubbing of the trick play bar during the availability window of live linear streams.

    • An enableThumbnailTilesDuringLive flag that lets developers specify whether the Video node should report the thumbnail tiles in the thumbnailTiles field for live linear streams (the thumbnailTiles field will be added to the Video node documentation as part of the Roku OS 11.0 release).

  • Video decoder statistics — The Video node includes a new decoderStats field that provides developers with additional video playback information such as the number of frames rendered, repeated, and dropped, and the number of bit stream errors since playback started. Also included is a new enableDecoderStats field that allows the decoderStats field to receive updates.
  • Muting of audio during video playback — The roVideoPlayer component now includes a SetEnableAudio() function that enables developers to mute the audio during video playback. This is useful, for example, for implementing a video preview feature in an app.
  • Check whether the TV screen is on/off — The ifDeviceInfo.GetDisplayProperties() function now returns a new visible field that enables developers to check whether the TV screen is on/off. Customers can turn off their TV display while streaming an app in order to continue listening to the audio (for example, when playing music videos, conferences, or podcasts).
  • ttp:timebase support added for DASH/TTML — The Roku OS now supports ttp:timebase for activating subtitles.

Tools

Roku OS 10.5

Initial rollout date: September 20, 2021

Roku OS 10.5 includes a SceneGraph component for creating lines of text with different fonts, colors, and sizes; a SceneGraph component for displaying help with app settings; and ChannelStore APIs for checking whether a subscription should be placed on hold because it is in recovery.

This release includes several enhancements to Roku Voice. For apps that include a profile selection screen, Roku Voice can be used to ask the viewer to select a profile and handle a voice command with the name or position of the profile. Voice keyboards include improved dictation that lets developers determine when a user has finished talking and specify which characters the keyboard accepts or blocks. The individual keys on voice keyboards can now be enabled only once the user has entered complete information (for example, all five digits in a zip code).

In addition, this release includes features that enhance the performance of media playback and Roku devices in general and expand platform support for industry standards covering content metadata.

For tools, this release adds more detailed "type mismatch" reporting to the BrightScript Debug Console and an Execute command to the BrightScript Debug Protocol that lets developers execute code in a specific stack frame and therefore evaluate and run expressions.

Below is a list of key developer-facing Roku OS 10.5 updates:

Roku OS APIs

As part of the Roku OS 10.5 release, a LabelBase node has been introduced to provide a single base class for the Label node and the MultiStyleLabel node. The Label node now inherits most of its functionality from LabelBase node class. Developers, however, do not need to update their code to account for this refactoring.

  • RowList.currFocusColumn field for implementing horizontal pagination — A new currFocusColumn field has been added to the RowList node to indicate which column of the currently-focused row in a RowList component currently has focus. Developers can use this field to implement a horizontal pagination mechanism for the currently focused row.
  • Elliptic-curve cryptography for generating digital signatures — Developers can use the new roDSA component, which provides support for the ECDSA and EdDSA (with Ed25519 form) digital signature algorithms, to provide cryptographically signed evidence that an ad request originated from an actual Roku device.

Roku Pay APIs

  • ChannelStore subscription recovery (also available in Roku OS 10.0) — Developers can now directly use the ChannelStore API to check whether a subscription is in recovery. When a subscritpion is in recovery, Roku Pay notifies the customer once a day for multiple consecutive days (typically three) to update their method of payment in order to renew the subscription, and it attempts to charge the customer's method of payment to ensure collection of payment and continuation of service. The ChannelStore.getAllPurchases and getPurchases commands now return a status field and an inDunning flag to determine whether a subscription is in the dunning state and therefore should be placed on hold. Previously, developers had to pass the transactionId returned by the getAllPurchases and getPurchases commands into a Roku Pay validate-transaction API call to determine whether a subscription was in recovery.

Roku Voice APIs

  • Voice support for profile selection screens — Apps with a profile selection screen can audibly and visually prompt the viewer to select a user profile and then handle a voice request with the name or position of the selected profile. This entails integrating the following APIs included in this release:

    • The roAppManager.StartVoiceActionSelectionRequest() function can be called upon app launch to trigger a voice request for the viewer to select a user profile on devices that are paired with a hands-free Roku Voice remote control.
    • The roAppManager.SetVoiceActionStrings() function can be used by the app to register a list of text strings, such as user profile names, that can be matched to voice requests. When the name uttered by the user matches the registered text string, the matched text string is provided to the app via an roInput voice command handler (via a new text field included in the associative array returned by the roInputEvent.GetInfo() method).
    • The roInput voice command handler has also been enhanced to support profile selection via ordinal numbers. For example, when a user says "first", "number one", "pick the first", "select the first", "choose the first", and so on to select a user profile within a row, the app will receive a value of "1" (via a new ordinal field included in the associative array returned by the roInputEvent.GetInfo() method) that can be used to select the corresponding profile. Ordinal numbers between 1–6 are supported.

  • Device paired with hands-free remote flag — Developers can call the roDeviceInfo.HasFeature("handsfree_voice") function to check whether a Roku device is paired with a hands-free Roku remote control such as the Roku Voice Remote Pro. Developers can call this function before calling the roAppManager.StartVoiceActionSelectionRequest() function and having Roku Voice prompt the viewer to select a user profile. In addition, this function enables developers to tailor the in-app user experience for viewers with hands-free Roku remote controls (for example, displaying voice tips and tricks in the UI).

  • Enhanced dictation for voice keyboards — Developers can use the new isDictating field of the VoiceTextEditBox node to check whether the user is currently dictating to the keyboard. This enables developers, for example, to determine whether users are done dictating and therefore can advance to the next step/screen in the UI. In addition, developers can use the new voiceInputRegexFilter field of the VoiceTextEditBox node to specify which characters may or may not be entered on the keyboard via dictation. For example, setting this field to "^[A-Za-z0-9_-]*$" prevents any special characters from being entered.
  • New Voice control manifest flags — Developers can now declare whether their app supports voice controls (supports_voice_roinput=1) and whether it displays a hands-free voice profile selection screen upon launch (voice_action_launch_screen=1).

Media, DRM, and content metadata updates

  • Randomizing of Widevine DRM license renewal time — A new lic_acq_window field has been added to the Content metadata DRM control attributes to help developers prevent their app's Widevine license server from being flooded with simultaneous requests. This lic_acq_window field is used to set the maximum amount of time (in milliseconds) that an app waits before rotating its Widevine DRM keys. The app can generate a random wait time between 0 and the value specified in the lic_acq_window field, and use the random wait time to instruct when the Video node should make its next Widevine license request.
  • SegmentTimeline for calculating time/duration in a DASH stream — Support for DASH-IF in the Roku OS now includes using the SegmentTimeline to precisely identify segment availability. This supports the in-progress playback of content while it is being recorded. Specifically, the Roku OS DASH implementation now supports:
  • Initialization element with sourceURL attribute in under SegmentBase element.
  • RepresentationIndex element.
  • Index segments in a different file than the media segments.
  • Index segments from multiple representations in the same file.
  • Media segments from multiple representations in the same file.
  • Non-standard AudioChannelConfiguration schema: "urn:dolby:dash:audio_channel_configuration:2011".

Architecture

  • New "screensaver" and "homelist" ad source parameters — The Roku OS now includes "ad:screensaver" and "ad:homelist" source parameters, which enable developers to attribute app launches to these specific ad types. Previously, a single "ad" source parameter was used for all the different ad types (homelist [mini], screensaver, and home screen banner ads). The "ad" source parameter now denotes an app launch from a home screen banner ad only.

Tools

  • Detailed "type mismatch" error reporting in BrightScript debug console — The BrightScript debug console now provides more specific reporting of "type mismatch" errors to help developers identify and resolve these types of bugs in their code. For example, attempting to evaluate whether an integer value equals a string in an expression (for example, if 12 = "number") now results in the following error message: Type mismatch. Operator "=" cannot be applied to "Integer" and "String".

Deprecations

  • wma and wmapro. The Roku platform no longer supports the Windows Media Audio (wma) and WMApro audio formats. See the Audio node for the current list of audio formats supported by the Roku platform.

Roku OS 10.0

Initial rollout date: April 13, 2021

Roku OS 10.0 adds a new chanperf command to the debug console that displays the memory and CPU usage of a sideloaded app. This provides developers with a quick, convenient way to find performance issues in different parts of their application.

In addition, developers can now upgrade the keyboards, mini keyboards, PIN pads in their apps to the new dynamic voice-enabled keyboards, which allow customers to use their voice to enter information. This release also makes Roku's standard dialog framework available to developers, which provides enhanced pre-built dialogs and the flexibility to design custom dialogs.

Other highlights include an enhancement to the ChannelStore API that optimizes the text displayed in the Request for Information (RFI) screen based on whether the customer is signing up for a subscription or signing in to their account, updates to the ChannelStore API for getting additional customer information such as their birth, gender, and location (country, state, zip code), and new functions for checking the internet connectivity status on a Roku device.

This release also includes features that enhance the performance of media playback, app installation, and Roku devices in general, and it provides expanded platform support for industry standards covering content and meta-data, as well as additional and improved facilities to expedite the monitoring of app performance and memory usage.

Below is a list of key developer-facing Roku OS 10.0 updates:

API

Media, DRM, and content meta-data updates

  • Media Player performance enhancements — Video start times have been shortened, re-buffering reduced, and picture quality improved.
  • Roku SceneGraph (RSG) performance enhancements — Various RSG data structures have been optimized, and off-screen content nodes are now being managed on an app's behalf. This reduces app memory consumption, allowing internal cache mechanisms to be more effective in improving performance.
  • Support for UTCTiming in DASH — The UTCTiming element is used in DASH manifests to allow the clocks employed by the server and player to remain in close synchronization. Without this, when there is a timing discrepancy of even as little as 100ms between the local and server clocks live video play can freeze, and audio and video can fall out of sync, as the player requests unavailable, out-of-window segments.
  • Seek-to-pause is now supported through Video node enhancements. The bufferingStatus field now includes boolean prebufferDone and time element actualStart, which are used in conjunction with seekMode and playStart to facilitate pausing at a particular point, and resuming playback from that point. (Also available in Roku OS 9.4)
  • The HLS ASSOC-LANGUAGE audio rendition attribute is now supported. This optional attribute is used, for example, to specify that a particular rendition's audio, provided in a given spoken language dialect (e.g., Cantonese/"yue"), is represented in forced subtitles by a different but associated language (e.g., Traditional Chinese/"zh_HANT").
  • The DASH Role and Accessibility attributes may now be used in Adaptation Sets to make various audio tracks available for viewer selection. This brings Roku OS into closer conformance with the DASH-IF specification.

Architecture

  • Dynamic voice-enabled keyboards — Developers can create keyboards, mini keyboards, and pin pads that can be controlled by voice. This helps speed up on-device sign-ups and sign-ins by enabling customers to speak their PIN codes when subscribing to apps and their passwords when logging in. A sample app demonstrating this feature is available here.

  • Standard dialog framework — Developers can use new pre-built modal pop-up dialogs and build custom ones. A sample app demonstrating this feature is available here.

    These new pre-built and custom standard keyboards are summarized as follows:

    • New pre-built message, keyboard, pin pad, and progress dialogs. These new dialogs feature updated graphics and color palette support that enable developers to provide a consistent user experience across the dialogs in their app and across the Roku platform (developers can easily adopt the new design of Roku OS system dialogs). In addition, the keyboard and pin pad dialogs include voice entry support for faster and more convenient information entry. These new dialog nodes deprecate the legacy versions.

    • Developer-defined custom dialogs. Developers can design custom dialogs that may include a combination of text, buttons, bulleted lists, keyboards, loading indicators, and other building blocks. Custom dialogs also include all the features provided by the pre-built dialogs (voice, custom layout, and graphics). This provides developers with the flexibility to build and configure dialogs to meet their app's requirements.

      Some fields used to set options on the Dynamic voice-enabled keyboards and the StandardDialog nodes always print their value as “invalid” in BrightScript. Equality comparisons of these field values will also not work correctly. Setting the value of these fields from either BrightScript or XML does work correctly. These fields include:

      The voiceEntryType field of the VoiceTextEditBox node. The domain field of the DynamicKeyboardBase node. The keyboardDomain field of the StandardKeyboardDialog node. The bulletType field of the StdDlgBulletTextItem node. The graphicAlign field of the StdDlgGraphicItem node. The keyLayout field of the StdDlgKeyboardItem node. The namedTextStyle field of the StdDlgTextItem node.

  • Enhanced Visual Search Results for Roku Voice - When users ask for content while in an app, the Roku UI displays a partial overlay with content matching the search request. Content from within the active app is listed in the first row of the display if the active app participates in Roku Search. The rows below include matches from other apps.
  • Instant Resume — Developers can implement Instant Resume in their app to save their current state upon exit and then continue playback upon relaunch. This improves the user experience by letting viewers quickly get back to the content they were watching without having to find it first.
  • The number of concurrent threads per running instance of an app is now limited to 100 — When the instance exceeds 50 concurrent threads, Roku displays a warning on the port 8085 console. When the instance exceeds 100 threads, a “too many threads” error exception (&h29) is raised; if the app does not catch this exception, app operation is terminated, along with a corresponding stack trace. Task threads that have properly terminated and are no longer running will not count towards the limit, even if the task object itself is still valid (e.g., the state is stopped or done). As a best practice, developers should take steps to ensure that their apps always remain well under the 50-thread "warning" limit.
  • New manifest attribute pause_aware and corresponding pause button event— Use the new key event when the app strictly needs to pause, and not toggle between play and pause (as might happen, for example, during trickplay, in situations where the proper behavior is to leave fast-forward or rewind mode but not immediately begin playing).

Tools

This release includes three new or updated port 8080 commands:

  • New remove_plugin command that deletes a particular app from the local device as well as from other devices on the same Roku account. The local device, on which the remove_plugin command is executed, must be linked to a Roku account, and deletions elsewhere don't take effect until a device synchronizes with the Streaming Store. Some system capabilities, such as RAF, can be implemented/augmented by the installation of special apps. Especially in beta-test situations, the developer can delete old versions of such channels before installing more recent (or production) versions.

Deprecated APIs

  • Apps must replace all file:// URLs with pkg:/ URLs.

Roku OS 9.4

Initial rollout date: September 29, 2020

Roku OS 9.4 introduces formal BrightScript exception handling via TRY/CATCH/THROW statements, and it adds a number of media playback features such as whitelisting/blacklisting of audio and caption tracks for different countries; support for OpenSSL 1.1.1, Widevine v16 DRM, and the WebP image format; and enhancements to DASH thumbnails for trick mode.

Below is a list of key developer-facing Roku OS 9.4 updates:

API

  • BrightScript now supports exception handling — Developers can use TRY/CATCH blocks and THROW expressions for handling exceptions in their apps. Developers can define code that may potentially generate errors within a TRY statement, and then provide error handling, such as printing out the error type and message, in a CATCH statement. Developers can also create custom errors with the THROW expression.
  • New getUserRegionData command added to SceneGraph ChannelStore node — The ChannelStore node now includes a getUserRegionData command for retrieving the state, zip code, and country associated with the customer's Roku account. Developers can use the location information returned by this command to determine a customer's eligibility for regional-specific subscription products and content.
  • doOrder command status fixed — The SceneGraph ChannelStore doOrder command now only returns a status of 2 ("interrupted") if the back button is pressed from a "Confirm Purchase" dialog.

Media, DRM, and content meta-data updates

  • Enhanced media player performance — Numerous improvements in media player performance to minimize video start time, re-buffering, and playback failure rates.
  • Open SSL 1.1.1 — Roku OS now supports Open SSL 1.1.1. The OpenSSL version that was previously supported by Roku (1.0.2h) has reached end of life. OpenSSL 1.1.1 offers better performance and greater security, among other benefits.
  • Widevine v16 — Roku OS now supports Widevine v16 DRM, including on older supported platforms.
  • WebP image format — The Roku platform now supports the WebP image format, which provides smaller compressed image files and faster decoding and rendering.
  • DASH thumbnail improvements — The DASH manifest information is now provided more efficiently to the Roku Media Player, especially benefiting low-end devices.
  • HLS and DASH trickplay thumbnails in SSAI apps now remain in sync — A bug in the handling of discontinuities (insertion breaks) for trickplay thumbnails in apps with ads inserted server-side (SSAI) previously caused thumbnails to fall out of synch with the video content over time during playback, as more discontinuities were processed. This bug is resolved in Roku OS 9.4 for HLS and DASH streaming with standard thumbnails, but it remains a problem for apps that use BIF thumbnails. Roku recommends that developers who can switch to standard thumbnails in the context of HLS or DASH streaming should do so.

Adobe has discontinued support for Adobe DRM. Roku OS 9.4 is the last firmware release that will support it. apps should switch to one of the following Roku-supported DRMs to protect content: Widevine, PlayReady, or AES-128.

Tools

Deprecated APIs

Roku OS 9.3

Initial rollout date: April 7, 2020

Roku OS 9.3 includes features to enhance the performance of media playback and Roku devices in general, and expand platform support for industry standards covering content and meta-data. This release also features additional and improved facilities to expedite troubleshooting, performance monitoring, automated testing, and debugging of apps.

Finally, the Roku SceneGraph version defaults to version 1.2 as of Roku OS 9.3. As a result, use of eval() will result in a compilation error.

Apps using eval() will not run on Roku OS 9.3 (unless rsg_version has been set to 1.1, which is not recommended).

Developers must take immediate action to ensure that their apps do not use the eval() function, if at all possible. See "Architecture," below, for more details.

Here is a list of key developer-facing Roku OS 9.3 updates:

API

  • Single-field observers can capture multiple-field "snapshots" — The observeField() and observeFieldScoped() methods of SceneGraph nodes can now specify a list of additional fields (that are located in the same node as the primary field), the values of which will be captured when the state of the primary field changes. The corresponding roSGNodeEvent will provide those additional values via its GetInfo() method.

Media, DRM, and content meta-data updates

  • Performance enhancements — These include an increase in effective video bitrate, and reductions in the rates of video start time, re-buffering, and playback failure.
  • More granular DASH MPD Manifest data now accessible — Apps can now obtain all relevant data from the DASH MPD Manifest.
  • Verimatrix DRM is deprecated — As of Roku OS 9.3, support for Verimatrix DRM has been removed from the firmware. Make sure that content in your app is protected using one of the following Roku-supported DRMs: Microsoft PlayReady or Widevine. Click here for more information on implementing these DRMs.
  • Adobe DRM is deprecated — As of Roku OS 9.3, support for Adobe DRM is deprecated. The plugin will be removed from Roku OS in our Fall firmware update. Please make sure that content in your app is protected using one of the following Roku-supported DRMs: Microsoft PlayReady or Widevine. Click here for more information on implementing these DRMs.

Architecture

  • rsg_version manifest flag defaults to 1.2 — The rsg_version attribute in the manifest now defaults to 1.2 (rsg_version=1.2). As of Roku OS 9.0, setting the rsg_version attribute to 1.2 enables an internal mechanism for processing component <script> tags that optimizes the resulting compiled script code. This results in a reduced initial startup time and lesser memory usage while preserving compatibility.The deprecated eval() function is not compatible with rsg_version 1.2; therefore, developers must do one of the following to keep their apps running if their apps use this function:1. (Recommended) Remove all usage of the deprecated eval() function. If you are using the eval() function to initialize data, use the parseJSON() function instead.2. Update the rsg_version attribute in the manifest to 1.1 (rsgversion=1.1).

Tools

  • Dynamic breakpoints and step commands added to BrightScript Debug Protocol — The socket-based BrightScript debug protocol now includes dynamic breakpoints and step commands. Integrated Development Environments (IDEs) tightly integrated with the BrightScript debug protocol can be enhanced with these features, which enable developers to navigate through and inspect the state of the application and view its execution flow.

Miscellaneous

  • Visual Search Results for Roku Voice (U.S. only) — This new aspect of Roku Voice provides developers who participate in Roku Search with enhanced discovery opportunities. When using Roku Voice to search for movies, shows or popular genres, users will now see a more visual, easy to browse display of movie and TV show artwork rather than a text-based list of options. This new search results screen orders the results in categorized rows that include relevant movies, shows, short-form content and more for simple navigation and quick discovery of entertainment. Once a user selects the specific movie or show they want to watch, they'll see an unbiased list of apps that offer that title, ordered by price (including free when available), so they can choose the viewing option that's best for them.

Roku OS 9.2

Initial rollout date: September 24, 2019

Roku OS 9.2 includes a variety of media updates that allow developers to optimize playback and further secure their protected content. This firmware update also introduces APIs that enable developers to further customize app UIs.

A list of key developer-facing Roku OS 9.2 updates is included below.

API

Media playback

  • CDN switching — Developers can switch Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) during playback to load balance traffic and failover to different servers in order to help optimize performance.
  • Forced narrative subtitles — The Roku OS now supports the display of forced narrative subtitles on the video player. This enables a dialog or on-screen text (for example, newspaper headlines, street signs, and so on) to be translated into alternate languages to help viewers understand the words being spoken or displayed.
  • Support for templated DASH streams that have Widevine — The Roku media player now supports playback of DASH streams that have both templated representation and Widevines licenses.
  • DASH/HLS multi-license support — Developers can protect content with resolution-specific licenses. This means developers can, for example, secure the 4K version of content with a Widevine level 1 license, and the FHD and lower versions with a Widevine level 2 license.

Deprecated APIs

  • Roku device MAC Address via roDeviceInfo.GetConnectionInfo — The roDeviceInfo.GetConnectionInfo() method no longer returns a device's MAC address. Developers can use the roDeviceInfo.GetChannelClientId method to uniquely identify devices.
  • AudioLanguageSelected attribute — The AudioLanguageSelected content metadata attribute no longer can be used to specify the language track to be used when content has multiple language tracks. Users can select their preferred audio language on-device in the Settings > Audio > Audio Preferred Language screen.

Roku OS 9.1

Initial rollout date: April 9, 2019

Roku OS 9.1 adds new line-level debugging to the BrightScript Profiler tool, which enables developers to better pinpoint high memory and CPU usage. In addition, this update adds signal beacons to measure video start time, app change time, and app exit times, which helps developers verify that their app's performance meets certification requirements.

Below is a list of new APIs, media updates, and tools for developers. Changes to deprecated APIs are listed as well.

The roDeviceInfo.GetDeviceUniqueId() function now returns all zeros instead of a device ID. Apps that are still using this function in an authentication flow will fail until an app update is published. Developers should migrate to the roDeviceInfo.GetChannelClientId() function to get a device ID for their app. Key Roku OS 9.1 features:

APIs

  • Encryption/decryption API – Developers can now encrypt and decrypt data on a device using a key that is unique per app, device, or model. Using an app key, for example, developers can encrypt data for an app so that it may only be decrypted by that same app. In this case, a developer could provision credentials or an API key from the cloud to devices securely. With a device key, for example, a developer could implement a secure-storage algorithm.

  • Performance testing – Developers can now measure the performance of user-initiated actions on their apps to validate that their apps meet certification requirements. The Roku OS automatically records key app performance metrics such as video start time, app change time, and app exit times via signal beacons (markers for the start and stop points of user-initiated actions). In addition, developers can manually add signal beacons to their applications to measure and record app launch times, which cannot be detected automatically by the Roku OS. Developers can then use the debug console to view log entries for these app performance metrics.

  • Voice command handling – Developers can implement voice controls to respond to voice commands such as "fast forward", "rewind", "pause", "resume", "start over", "replay", and so on. These voice commands may be sent from the Roku voice remote, Roku mobile app, or a virtual assistant such as Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant.

  • Purchase history API – Developers can now get a customer's purchase history, which makes it easier to determine free-trial eligibility in subscription renewal flows.

  • Enhanced partner account creation – Developers can now use the ChannelNode to store an OAuth token, custom token, or other custom data and then retrieve the credential during authentication. This is the same functionality that has been available with the roChannelStore SDK1 component since firmware release 8.1.

  • Audio/video codec change detection – Developers can now detect when the audio or video codec has changed (for example, the Roku is plugged into a different A/V receiver or TV) and then check the current audio/video playback capability.

Media, DRM, and content meta-data updates

  • Media player error and diagnostics reporting – Developers now have access to more detailed error reporting to help diagnose video play errors. When an error occurs, the new reporting will explain why media playback failed and, if applicable, which syntax or feature in the content is incompatible.

BrightScript Profiler features

Changes to Deprecated APIs

  • roDeviceInfo.GetDeviceUniqueId() – The roDeviceInfo.GetDeviceUniqueId() method now returns a string of zeroes instead of the 12-character alphanumeric string for the device serial number. Developers should use the roDeviceInfo.GetChannelClientId() method to get a 12-character device ID for their app. For an overview of the consumer features added in Roku OS 9.1, visit the Roku Blog.

Roku OS 9

Initial rollout date: October 23, 2018

Roku OS 9 introduces a new manifest flag which adds drastic improvements to the memory footprint and launch times of Roku SceneGraph (RSG) apps. All RSG apps should set the "rsg_version=1.2" manifest entry to run the new, higher performing SceneGraph update. This update also adds memory profiling capabilities to the BrightScript Profiler tool, enabling developers to better identify memory leaks in their apps.

Below is a list of new APIs, tools, performance enhancements, and media updates for developers.

SceneGraph enhancements

  • New manifest flag for "rsg_version=1.2" — By adding this new manifest entry, developers enable tremendous memory savings and app launch time improvements in RSG apps. The "rsg_version=1.2" manifest entry enables a new internal mechanism for processing component <script> tags that optimizes the resulting compiled script code. This results in a major reduction in the app's initial startup time and uses dramatically less memory while preserving total compatibility. Initial startup time is typically reduced by approximately 30% when this manifest flag is set. Memory savings range from 10 - 20MiB in a moderately complex app, with up to 40MiB saved in a complex app with extensive component hierarchies.
  • eval() is no longer supported for "rsg_version=1.2" — In order to realize the load time performance and memory benefits enabled by the "rsg_version=1.2" entry, eval() can no longer be supported. Any use of eval() will cause compilation and runtime errors if "rsg_version=1.2" is in the app’s manifest.
  • Faster AssociativeArray access — Read and write access into and out of AssociativeArray fields on nodes, and retrieval of AssociativeArrays using roSGNodeEvent.getData() has been made 5x faster. The semantics of AssociativeArray fields are copy on read and write, and copy on roSGNodeEvent.getData(). Apps that heavily use AAs can expect dramatic speed increases that directly translate to user-perceivable operations.
  • Faster rendezvous — This change enables an auxiliary thread to handle rendezvous operations when the render thread is occupied with tasks that don't need rendezvous protection. The result is dramatic speed-ups for rendezvous operations, particularly on Roku devices with lesser processing power.
  • Faster component creation — Node creation times have been improved in Roku OS 9.
  • ZoomRowList component — ZoomRowList, a RowList component where the focused item is zoomed in, is now available for developers.
  • roSGNode.threadInfo() method — A new diagnostic function, threadInfo(), has been added to the ifSGNodeField interface. With few exceptions, this function may be called from any component, on any thread, in any function, at any time.

New BrightScript Profiler features

The BrightScript Profiler now includes a memory profiling tool that can be used to help developers identify memory leaks or memory that is allocated during app operation without ever being freed. Roku OS 9 also adds support for streaming of profiling data to a local network host.

Media, DRM, and content meta-data updates

  • Dash EventStream - Dash EventStream elements are supported in Roku OS 9.
  • [BETA] Opening Widevine DRM CBCS decryption mode — Roku OS 9 adds CBCS decryption support for Widevine DRM in DASH and HLS streams. At this stage, Widevine support is considered in beta on the Roku platform.
  • [BETA] DASH XLink support - Roku OS 9 adds DASH XLink support, including EventStream events that are surfaced to the app through the timedMetaData field.
  • Widevine key rotation - Roku OS 9 also adds support for Widevine key rotation and license renewal for Dash and HLS content.

Miscellaneous

  • New manifest entry for a "game" app — Developers can now set the "game" manifest entry (game=1) to avoid audio delays in their game apps.
  • roList indexing is no longer disturbed by array index access — The behavior of roList indexing has been modified to yield more intuitive results and resolve bugs. As of Roku OS 9, when implementing roList, ifEnum enumeration and ifList enumeration will use a separate and independent internal 'pointers' to the current element, instead of a "current integer index" variable. This has been done to ensure the ifList index position does not corrupt the roList index when the array read/write operators are used.
  • Programmatic access to BIFs through BrightScript — Two new fields, getNearestFrame and nearestFrame, have been added to the BifDisplay component so that developers can now access BIFs programmatically in their apps. Previously a BrightScript app had to use the built-in trickplay UI to access these BIFs.

For an overview of the consumer features added in Roku OS 9, visit the Roku Blog.

Roku OS 8.2

Initial rollout date: September 26, 2018

Roku OS 8.2 is a firmware update focused primarily on firmware optimizations and bug fixes, along with new features that will enable Roku TV models to work seamlessly with the upcoming Roku TV Wireless Speakers. This update introduces no new features, APIs, console logs, or tooling about which developers should be mindful.

For our consumer release notes, see here.

Roku OS 8.1

Initial rollout date: May 1, 2018

Media, DRM, and content meta-data updates

  • PlayReady 3 Update — All Roku devices with MStar chips update to the PlayReady 3 library with Roku OS 8.1. Previously they included PlayReady 2.5.
  • [BETA] Opening Access to Widevine DRM — Roku OS 8.1 adds support for Widevine DRM for DASH streams. At this stage, Widevine support is considered in beta on the Roku platform.

  • Digital Rights Management (DRM) control attributes — Content metadata control attributes for DRM have been added to the Roku OS.

    • Passing custom HTTP headers to licensing requests — Developers looking to pass custom HTTP headers with a licensing request can now set those headers using the ifHttpAgent interface methods on the Video node.

  • Media Player content metadata updates — Two content metadata attributes of the Media Player have been updated and three new attributes have been added:

    • PlayDuration is no longer used by the media player.

    • BookmarkPosition is being deprecated.

      • The existing PlayStart attribute should be used instead as it has been modified to allow apps to seek to positions prior to PlayStart. the Roku OS will continue to support BookmarkPosition to maintain the backward compatibility, but apps should plan a migration to use PlayStart.
    • A new content meta-data attribute, ClipStart, sets the clip start position.
    • A new content meta-data attribute, ClipEnd, sets the clip end position.
    • A new content meta-data attribute, LiveBoundsPauseBehavior, allows an app to customize Media Player behavior on live streams when playing in the earliest part of a DVR buffer.

Deprecated APIs

Five roDeviceInfo methods are being deprecated and replaced with similar APIs (as seen in the chart below).

The deprecated APIs will remain in the Roku OS and continue to work for one year; they will be removed from the Roku OS in the Spring 2019 OS update. Developers must update their apps to use the new APIs within the next year.

Below is a complete list of the APIs deprecated as of Roku OS 8.1.

Deprecated API Replacement API
GetDrmInfo() GetDrmInfoEx()
GetAdvertisingId() GetRIDA()
IsAdIdTrackingDisabled() IsRIDADisabled()
GetClientTrackingId() GetChannelClientId()
GetDeviceUniqueId() N/A — Use GetChannelClientId()

General API Enhancements

  • Memory-level notification — This release adds a memory-level notification API (generalMemoryLevel) to roDeviceInfoEvent to fire notifications to the app. Apps can also query the memory level directly using two new methods of the roDeviceInfo component.
  • GetUserCountryCode() API — To determine the country associated with a user’s Roku account, a new method GetUserCountryCode() as String was added to roDeviceInfo.
  • roRegex.MatchAll() — A new method MatchAll(), has been added to roRegex. This adds the ability to return all matches of a specific regular expression pattern in the target string.
  • Getting captions mode from device event — The developer can now call GetInfo() on a device event to know the current global setting for closed caption mode property using isCaptionModeChanged().
  • API to determine if a Roku TV is Energy Star Compliant — Developers can determine if a Roku powered TV is Energy Star Compliant by using the roDeviceInfo.HasFeature("energy_star_compliant") API.
  • storeChannelCredData API — This OS update introduces a new roChannelStore method, StoreChannelCredData(), that allows apps to store information in our backend which they can retrieve later using GetChannelCred(). Calling this new API allows developers to store OAuth tokens for a signed-in user so that when the app is launched on a new Roku device, the app can request the stored information, identify their customer, and automatically sign them in.

SceneGraph Updates

  • ReplaceChildren() ignores extra items in the replace list — When using replaceChildren() to update the content of each item in a markupGrid, if the developer supplies more items than there are in the original list (going from 4 items to 5), the 'extra' items are ignored and not added as children.
  • Mobile or ECP keypress events now appear in onKeyEvent() — Literal key keypress events (such as keyboard letters, and so forth) that are sent to via the mobile app or ECP keydown/keyup commands, now go to the onKeyEvent() handler. Previously, only keys that corresponded to remote keys went to the onKeyEvent handler.
  • SimpleLabel - Roku OS version 8.1 introduces SimpleLabel which is a lightweight complement node to the Label node. It supports simplified font style specification and is more memory efficient than the Label node.

Roku OS 8

Initial rollout date: October 2, 2017

Performance & optimization

  • fps_display command — A new command, fps_display, has been added to Telnet port 8080 to display frames-per-second and free memory on-screen. Developers can leverage this tool to optimize their app UI.
  • Registry ReadMulti and WriteMulti APIs — roRegistrySection adds two new APIs, WriteMulti and ReadMulti — to allow apps to read/write multiple keys at a time.
  • [BETA] New file system for data caching — A new file system, cachefs:, has been introduced to allow applications to cache data to volatile or persistent storage. Users who extend the persistent storage available on their device by adding an SD card will see the biggest benefit as application data will survive reboots and benefit from additional cache space to improve performance. Users without extended storage will also benefit from the use of a shared in-memory cache that is automatically managed by the system to optimize for the most recently used assets.

  • RSG platform performance improvements — Many improvements have been built into the Roku OS itself, enabling better support for low-end devices. All apps automatically inherit these benefits, with no action required from the developer.

    • <script> include files no longer incur an expensive copy for each component that includes it.
    • The time penalty for rendezvous has been reduced.
    • The per-node memory penalty has been significantly reduced.
    • Image caching has been added for all apps.

SceneGraph updates

  • Support for RSG 1.0 functionality is deprecated — Starting with Roku OS 8, support for the “rsg_version=1.0” manifest flag is deprecated. This deprecation means that the 1.0 features continue to work in Roku OS 8, but will no longer be supported (and thus should not be expected to work) starting with our next major firmware release. Apps affected by the change in Roku’s observer callback model introduced in Roku OS 7.5 should be updated accordingly.

  • Video node updates — Many new fields have been added to the Video node:

    • captionStyle allows apps to style closed captions.
    • contentBlocked determines whether the current content is blocked.
    • supplementaryAudioVolume sets the volume of the description tracks separately from the main audio track.
    • availableAudioTracks has been updated to return/include audio description tracks, which are typically seen on broadcast TV.
  • itemHasFocus field for item components — A new optional field "itemHasFocus" has been added for RSG item components: MarkupList, MarkupGrid, RowList and TargetGroup. It stores a boolean value that indicates whether the item component currently is the focused item. Only one item component of any of the nodes should have itemHasFocus set to true.

  • ParentalControlPinPad — Roku OS 8 contains a new node, ParentalControlPinPad. It is a variant of the PinPad component, but with a few key differences:

    • The pin, pinLength, and secureModefields are made private.
    • If the user enters the correct pin, a 2-hour override of content blocking begins, similar to the system behavior on Roku TV.
    • If the user enters an incorrect PIN, the text fields are cleared automatically.
    • A new field, pinSuccess, exists for blocking content.
  • Rectangle node blendingEnabled support — A blendingEnabled field has been added to the RSG Rectangle component that specifies if the rectangle should be alpha blended with the nodes behind it.

System overlay & closed caption updates

  • Improvements to the system overlay — The behavior of the Roku system overlay has been modified, such that the system overlay now slides in whenever the * button is pressed, the Video node is in focus, and the app does not have its OnKeyEvent() handler fired. When the Video node is not in focus, the system overlay does not slide in and the OnKeyEvent() handler is fired.
  • System overlay notification event — A new notification has been added to roDeviceInfo. Apps can get notified when a system overlay is displayed.
  • roDeviceInfoEvent update — A new event, isCaptionModeChangedEvent, has been added to roDeviceInfoEvent to enable developers to check if the user changes the closed caption mode or track.
  • Closed caption track selection — It is no longer necessary for a app to partake in the CC track selection, apart from adding any tracks to the list of available tracks. the Roku OS now selects a CC track based on the preferred caption language selection in the system preferences. When the selected language is not available, it defaults to the system's UI language.

Miscellaneous

  • Case-preserving quoted keys in Associative Arrays — The quoted keys in Associative Array literals are now case-preserving. This change improves the readability of your code and is compatible with JSON usage.

  • CEC status events — A roCECStatusEvent has been added for set-top-boxes to determine their active display source status. Apps subscribing to the event will be notified when the active-source status of the device changes per the CEC message traffic.

Roku OS 7.7

Initial rollout date: June 20, 2017

Roku OS 7.7 focuses mainly on bug fixes and firmware optimizations to increase performance of Roku SceneGraph (RSG) apps.

SceneGraph additions and modifications

  • New event added for DASH manifest updates — A new field, manifestData, has been added to the Video node to detect the periods in a DASH manifest before they are played back. One major use case for this is to display ad markers in the trickplay progress bar.

  • New field to reflect current design resolution — A read-only field, currentDesignResolution, has been added to Scene nodes to determine which of the supported design resolutions is currently being used by RSG.

  • UI changes to the RowList & ArrayGrid components — Two new fields have been added to the RowList and ArrayGrid components to provide greater control over the UX:

    • RowList — rowCounterRightOffset
      Used to specify the location of the right edge of the row counter relative to right edge of the RowList's clipping rectangle.
    • RowList — showRowCounterForShortRows
      Determines whether the row counter is shown for all rows.
    • ArrayGrid — fadeFocusFeedbackWhenAutoScrolling
      Determines whether to fade the focus feedback indicator while scrolling multiple items.
    • ArrayGrid — currFocusFeedbackOpacity Provides access to the current opacity of the focus feedback indicator.

  • New field to play animations in reverse — A "reverse" boolean field has been added to the FloatFieldInterpolator, ColorFieldInterpolator, and Vector2DFieldInterpolator RSG nodes to allow for interpolated values to be computed in reverse.

  • Component compile time optimizations — Roku OS 7.7 includes several BrightScript compile time optimizations that significantly improve app launch times. In particular, RSG apps defining many components with the same script files will benefit from the largest app launch time enhancements.

These optimizations are in the Roku OS and require no action from the developer.

Additional updates

  • Manifest addition for confirming app launches — An optional field, "confirm_partner_button", has been added to the manifest to confirm app launches before leaving the current app after a partner button was pressed on the Roku remote. Use this feature to minimize the number of unintended app launches after a user accidentally hits a partner button while fast forwarding or rewinding content.

  • Manifest entry for overriding network connectivity HUD — Roku OS 7.7 introduces a system-level display for indicating when media playback is interrupted due to network connection failures. However, apps that have designed their own error dialogue for these interruptions can suppress this pop-up HUD by including a new flag in their manifest. The manifest entry to override the HUD is “suppress_unconnected_hud=1”.

For more information on the connectivity HUD, please read the related support article.

  • New logTypes added to ifSystemLog — ifSystemLog now supports a new logType: "http.complete". When enabled, the “http.complete” events will be sent to Roku after an http transfer is completed for adaptive streams. This event consolidates information related to a cURL transfer such as:

    • DNS look up time,
    • connection latency,
    • transfer speed
    • and number of bytes.

While Roku OS 7.7 is focused almost entirely on bug fixes and developer optimizations, it does include a few new consumer features.

For our consumer release notes, visit the Roku Blog.

Roku OS 7.6

Initial rollout date: April 11, 2017

SceneGraph updates

  • TVOD APIs — New APIs have been added to the RSG ChannelStore component to support in-app purchases. (roChannelStore)
  • New function for cloning an entire node tree — The clone() function has been added to ifSGNodeDict to clone an entire node tree, or just the node depending on the boolean value passed.
  • Convert structures containing arrays into an RSG node tree — An “update” function has been added to ifSGNodeChildren. Use ifSGNodeChildren.update() to convert objects with arrays and/or associative arrays into node trees.
  • Improved rotation animation — Fixed a rotation animation issue for the following device model groups: 2450X, 2500X, 27XXX, 37XXX, and 5000X. (FloatFieldInterpolator)

BrightScript updates

  • Microphone APIs — Added a roMicrophone component and roMicrophoneEvent for capturing voice input from the user. Note that apps in the Kids & Family category can not use these APIs.
  • HTTP/2 support - roUrlTransfer objects now support HTTP/2. Among the benefits, HTTP/2 support allows for connection sharing, which is accomplished by establishing all roUrlTransfers that could share a connection from the same Task thread.
  • Conditional compilation — BrightScript now supports conditional compilation, which allows blocks of code to be run only while set to true.
  • API to count node impressions — Two new fields — enableRenderTracking and renderTracking — have been added to RenderableNode to check whether a node is fully or partially rendered within the bounding rectangle of the screen. Developers can use this information to track node impressions.
  • Import BrightScript files using relative URIs — Developers can now specify URIs relative to the XML component’s file for the /<script/> element’s “uri” attribute.

  • New functions added to ifDeviceInfo -

    • GetGraphicsPlatform queries the device to see if it supports OpenGL or DirectFB. The function takes no arguments. The return is either “opengl” or “directfb” as a string.
    • GetClientTrackingId is an alias for the existing GetPublisherId function. The alternative function name is meant to help developers remember to use publisher ID instead of the device ESN.

BrightScript debugger updates

  • BrightScript profiler tool — A BrightScript profiler tool has been added to Roku OS to gather important metrics such as CPU usage and function “wall-clock” times. Use this tool to analyze performance and increase code efficiency. (BrightScript profiler documentation;visualization tool)
  • Rendezvous logging — Information on the thread rendezvous can now be accessed from within the developer console. To toggle this log setting, telnet to the device port 8080 and enter “enhanced_dev_log rendezvous [on|off]”. (Testing and debugging Roku apps)
  • Node operation performance metrics — Debug command “sgperf” has been added to port 8080 to track roSGNode operations by thread, whether it’s a create- or a subsequent-operation on an existing node, and whether it involved a rendezvous. (Testing and debugging Roku apps)
  • Shorthand debugger commands — Shorthand alternatives can now be used to replace many debugger commands. (Testing and debugging Roku apps)

New manifest entry

  • splash_rsg_optimization=1: Remove flicker between the splash screen and initial screen during app launch of SceneGraph apps

UI watchdog

UI watchdog was re-enabled in version 7.6.

The UI Watchdog is a timer that runs on the Roku system and ensures overall stability of the platform by forcing a reboot of the system if it appears to be hung. During normal system operation the timer (watchdog timeout value) is periodically reset to ensure that a reboot is not triggered. In the case of the UI Watchdog, the Roku OS will give a 3 second grace period for a sideloaded app locking/over-taxing the Render thread before a system reboot is triggered (for a Streaming Store installed app, the Roku OS gives a 10 second grace period).

Roku OS 7.5

Initial rollout date: November 1, 2016

SceneGraph updates

  • Thread rendezvous no longer timeout and will wait indefinitely.

  • New components:

  • New and updated fields:

    • <interface>: added roArray, rect2D, and rect2DArray types
    • LayoutGroup: "custom" alignment value for horizAlignment and vertAlignment to explicitly set translation values for each child layout
    • Poster node: bitmapMargins - set to an associative array containing margin information for 9-patch images
    • Animation: optional - set to true to skip animations on lower performing devices

    • Functional Fields

      • procedural functions that can be called on components directly
    • Overhang - added optionsText and optionsMaxWidth to customize the text next to the options (roku815px - (star)) symbol
    • RowList: rowTitleComponentName - specify an XML component to render text in place of the row label
    • findNode() arguments and nodeType fields are now case insensitive
    • ChannelStore node commands have been serialized to ensure that one command finishes before the next begins
    • Components in Component Libraries can be extended
    • Component Libraries can be unsigned if delivered over HTTPS
    • New Dialog fields: titleColor, titleFont, numberedBullets, bulletText, graphicWidth, graphicHeight, width, maxHeight
    • New ifSGNodeField methods: observeFieldScoped(), unobserveFieldScoped()

BrightScript updates

  • Updated components:

    • ifChannelStore: GetIdentity() - returns a unique number for this object that can be used to identify whether events originated from this object by comparing with roChannelStoreEvent.GetSourceIdentity().
    • ifTuner: GetChannelInfo().delivery_system, source_data.network_id, source_data.transport_stream_id

    • ifAppManager: SetAutomaticAudioGuideEnabled(enabled as Boolean)

      • enable/disable automatic Audio Guide and override any manifest setting

    • Content Meta-Data - Playback Configuration Attributes:

      • ForwardQueryStringParams - controls whether query string parameters from initial HLS stream manifest requests are forwarded to subsequent segment download requests
      • IgnoreStreamErrors - continue playback when encountering any streaming related errors
      • AdaptiveMinStartBitrate - minimum startup bitrate to start streaming with a variant equal to or greater than the value specified
      • AdaptiveMaxStartBitrate - maximum startup bitrate to start streaming with a variant less than or equal to the value specified
      • PlayStart - cannot be overridden by a seek operation
      • BookmarkPosition - can be overridden by a seek operation; this value takes precedence over PlayStart

    • roVideoPlayerEvent:

      • isStreamSegmentInfo.GetMessage() - supports segment information for HLS, DASH, and Smooth streams

      • isRequestFailed().GetInfo():

        • ClipIdx - The zero starting index of the item in the content list this event is related to
        • Ignored - true if the error was ignored and the player skipped to the next item in the content list

      • isPlaybackPosition().GetInfo():

        • ClipIdx - The zero starting index of the item in the content list this event is related to
        • ClipPos - player position relative to the start of the clip in milliseconds

    • ifVideoPlayer:

      • Play()

        • starts playback at the seek position if seek was called prior to play. If seek was not called, the player advances its current position to the next item in the content list and starts playing that item

      • Stop()

        • stops playback and resets the seek position, keeping the player’s current position unchanged

      • SetContentList()

        • Resets the current player position, the next time Play() is called playback will start at the first item of the content list (Unless Seek() is called prior); prefetching updates

    • ifDeviceInfo:

    • roDeviceInfoEvent:

      • GetInfo().audioGuideEnabled
      • GetInfo().exitedScreensaver
    • ifStringOps: Escape(), Unescape(), EncodeUri(), DecodeUri(), EncodeUriComponent(), DecodeUriComponent()
    • ifTextToSpeech: GetRate(), SetRate(), GetPitch(), SetPitch()

    • ifAssociativeArray: Items()

      • Returns an array containing the associative array key/value pairs in lexicographical order of key. Each item is in the returned array is an associative array with 'key' and 'value' fields.

New manifest entries

  • automatic_audio_guide_disabled: disable Audio Guide within an app
  • usb_media_handler: auto launch apps when a USB device is inserted
  • rsg_version: change the type of observer callback model used

BrightScript debugger updates

  • Port 8085 now provides context for all threads and port 8089-8093 will no longer be used.

    • STOP, breaks, and continue will stop/resume all threads. Prior to 7.5, only one thread would stop/resume.
    • See the overview on Debugging SceneGraph applications for more details.

  • New 8085 commands:

    • threads: list all current executed suspended threads
    • thread <id>: select a suspended thread to debug

  • New 8080 commands:

    • loaded_textures: display the current set of images loaded into texture memory
    • sgversion: change the observer callback model

External Control Protocol additions

Media Player updates

  • Fast Video Start can now prebuffer from non-zero positions, allowing for prebuffering of content in “Continue Watching” lists
  • Live DASH streaming support
  • The Roku MediaPlayer now automatically detects and plays a video even if the file type is not specified. All major file types — HLS, DASH, Smooth and MP4 — are detected
  • Video player automatically scales when changing to a different stream with different aspect ratios

Roku OS 7.2

Initial rollout date: June 21, 2016

This release adds two notable features. A text to speech feature has been added to allow all Roku applications to provide audible spoken versions of the user interface. Also, an option to buffer a video stream without actually playing it is now included, to provide a "fast start" video playback capability to your applications. You can use this option to begin buffering the video stream while a user is reading a description of the video, and then start the actual playback when the user selects it. Roku SceneGraph also supports this new option, as well as built-in support for Audio and Video node playlists, improved HTTPS support, improved debugging, and several other new features.

SceneGraph updates

  • A prebuffer option has been added to the control field of the Audio and Video nodes to allow buffering of media playback prior to the user starting the media item (Audio, Video, Playing Videos).
  • Screensavers can now be created in SceneGraph (Screensavers).
  • New debugging commands are available (Debugging SceneGraph Applications, ifSGNodeChildren).
  • The ChannelStore node class has been added for in-app purchase support in SceneGraph applications (ChannelStore).
  • The Task node has been modified (Task, SceneGraph Threads).
  • A bufferingStatus field has been added to the Audio node (Audio).
  • Timed meta-data is now supported for both Audio and Video node playback (Audio, Video).
  • Audio and Video nodes now have built-in support for playlists that can play several media items in sequence (Audio, Video).
  • HTTPS support is now available for all SceneGraph nodes (roHttpAgent).
  • A MaxVideoDecodeResolution field has been added to the Video node (Video).
  • New fields have been added to the Video node to allow customizing the internal ProgressBar node (Video).
  • New fields have been added to the Video node to allow customizing the internal TrickPlayBar node (Video).
  • The order of field setting of component-based lists and grids has changed (MarkupList, MarkupGrid, RowList).
  • Several new methods have been added to the ifSGNodeChildren interface (ifSGNodeChildren).

Component updates

BrightScript debugger updates

Roku OS 7.1

Initial rollout date: April 5, 2016

The 7.1 firmware release incorporates several BrightScript and BrightScript component improvements. There is now support for playing broadcast and cable content on a Roku TV which includes a tuner. SceneGraph has numerous improvements to the Video node, and new capabilities such as passing global data between components, passing parameters to callback functions, localization, and downloading libraries of SceneGraph components.

SceneGraph updates

  • Libraries of SceneGraph components can now be loaded and used at the start of a SceneGraph application (ComponentLibrary)
  • SceneGraph components can now be extended from other custom components (Creating Custom Components).
  • A uri field type has been added to better support URL resolution and features like certificates and cookies (Content Meta-Data).
  • Support for localization/internationalization string translations and automatic localized graphic image insertion (SceneGraph Localization).
  • Automatic scaling of image files to a specified size on download, with aspect ratio preserving options (Poster, PosterGrid).
  • Parameters can now be passed to observer callback functions (ifSGNodeField).
  • Global application data can now be more easily shared between components, using an m.global object reference (SceneGraph Data Scoping).
  • Support for node identity comparison (ifSGNodeDict).
  • Support for dynamic additions to interface fields for all nodes, allowing all node fields to be observed (ifSGNodeField, Node).
  • Video node class includes several new fields to configure trick play and other playback features (Video).
  • Focus indicators for list and grids can now be customized by blending the indicator colors (ArrayGrid).

  • New XML markup component interfaces:

    • onChange takes an associative array and a function name (<interface>)
    • calling functions from an associative array is now supported (<interface>)

BrightScript language updates

added increment (++) and decrement (–) operators to allow integer increment and decrement operations to have effect on a variable (Expressions, Variables, and Types)

added the following assignment operators to support mathematical and bitshift operations with numeric operands (Expressions, Variables, and Types):

  • +=
  • -=
  • *=
  • /=
  • \=
  • <<=
  • >>=

ReadAsciiFile() now supports UTF-16 files (Global Utility Functions)

BrightScript language fixes

  • Print now always explicitly prints the component type for enumerable objects. Previously, it would just print the contents of enumerable objects, and did not identify the container object itself, which could lead to confusion (Program Statements).

  • Print and FormatJSON no longer have side effects on enumation state when accessing enumerable objects (associative array, array, list, and so forth) (Program Statements, Global Utility Functions)

    Example:

    aa={a:2,b:1,c:3} : for each x in aa : print x;" from ";aa : end for

    Previously:

    a from ' ...

    Now:

    a from ' ...
    c from ' ...
    b from ' ...

Component changes

  • roTuner and associated interfaces have been added to support playing broadcast and cable content from a tuner (roTuner)
  • roProgramGuide and associated interfaces have been added to support broadcast content program guide data (roProgramGuide)
  • roSlideShow SetLoop added (roSlideShow)
  • roTextureManager ifHttpAgent added (roTextureManager)
  • roUrlTransfer GetToString(), AsyncGetToString() now support UTF-16 files (roUrlTransfer)
  • roAppManager/ifAppManager SetUserSignedIn() method added to indicate that a user has signed into the app (roAppManager)
  • roArray/ifArraySort Sort() method was added (roArray)
  • roArray/ifArraySort SortBy() method was added (roArray)
  • roArray/ifArraySort Reverse() method was added (roArray
  • roString/ifStringOps Split() method was added (roString)

Roku OS 7.0

Initial rollout date: November 6, 2015

SceneGraph XML API

A new user interface programming API has been added. Information on this new API can be found in:

Roku Search and follow

Users can now follow content from the Roku homescreen Search in addition to My Feed. This allows you to have users who choose to follow a particular search term (a movie, director, or an actor) to receive automatic updates when your latest content includes that term.

Roku 4 support

Support is now included for the Roku 4 Streaming Media Player. This Roku Player features greatly enhanced video resolution output up to 2160p (ultra-high definition, or UHD). This Roku Player also allows the creation and use of user interfaces with 1080p (full high-definition, or FHD) resolution. The Roku 4 Streaming Media Player includes a much more powerful quad core ARM processor and decoding support for the HEVC (high-efficiency video code) codec to allow efficient streaming of 2160p video content.

ECP install command

An install command has been added to the ECP to allow deep-linking to uninstalled apps.

BrightScript language

  • Associative array literals can now specify key names as string literals (quoted strings).
  • added aa.Keys to return the keys for an associative array
  • added a 64-bit LongInteger type

BrightScript components

roAssociativeArray

  • added Function Keys() As Object

roDeviceInfo

Roku OS 6.2

Initial rollout date: April 9, 2015

Roku Advertising Framework

BrightScript language

  • Now supports embedded quotation mark characters in string literals

BrightScript components

ifDateTime changes
ifDraw2D changes

Roku OS 6.1

Initial rollout date: December 4, 2014

BrightScript language

  • now supports integer division operator '\'
  • now supports integer bitshift operators '<<' and '>>'
  • roAssociativeArray Count function was added
  • parameter validation diagnostics have been added to core components
  • roString Replace method was added.
  • ParseJSON bug fixes
  • FormatJSON bug fixes
  • global function FindMemberFunction was added.
  • floats are now auto-boxed for method calls
  • global function Val has a new overload for parsing from hexadecimal strings etc.
  • global function StrI has a new overload for formatting hexadecimal strings etc.

BrightScript debugger

  • bscs 'Summarize BrightScript Component instances' command was added
  • brkd 'Break on BrightScript diagnostics' command was added

BrightScript components

roDeviceInfo changes
  • Added Function GetModelDetails() As Object
  • Added Function GetFriendlyName() As String
  • Added Function GetCreationTime(Void) As String
  • Added Function GetAudioDecodeInfo(Void) As Object
  • Added Function GetVideoDecodeInfo(Void) As Object
  • Added Function GetAdvertisingId(Void) As String
  • Added Function IsAdIdTrackingDisabled(Void) As Boolean
  • Added Function GetPublisherId(Void) As String
  • Added Function GetRandomUUID(Void) As String
roMessageDialog changes
  • Added Function UpdateButton(id As Integer, title As String) As Boolean

Roku OS 5.4

Initial rollout date: April 14, 2014

New in this release

  • Two new content metadata structures for controlling closed captions: SubtitleConfig and SubtitleTracks. Details of how to use these to control captions can be found here.
  • Two new caption renderer functions for retrieving all caption tracks in a stream and for setting the current track: ifCaptionRenderer.GetSubtitleTracks() and ChangeSubtitleTrack(). Details about these two new functions can be found here.
  • Bug fix: On the 2450X and 2500X platforms, the ifChannelStore.DoOrder() function was always returning false even if the corresponding purchase was successful.

Roku OS 5.3

Initial rollout date: December 17, 2013

Version 5.3 introduced user configurable closed caption settings. The Roku settings UI now includes controls for turning captions on or off at the system level. These settings control closed caption behavior for all apps. Closed captions on instant replay are also controlled from these settings.

Roku OS 5.2

Initial rollout date: October 8, 2013

Version 5.2 introduced a new security model for sideloading apps. Accessing the web interface for the device now requires a userid and password to log in. Please see the article here for more details: http://blog.roku.com/developer/2013/10/08/security-enhancements-added-to-channel-development

New in this release

  • Security enhancements to app sideloading

  • roListScreen.SetUpBehaviorAtTopRow()

  • Closed Captioning support added to roVideoPlayer, roCaptionRenderer added

  • HLS ID3 events added to BrightScript

Roku OS 5.1

Initial rollout date: August 5, 2013

New in this release

  • In-stream 608 captions support

  • updates to roVideoScreen events

  • FLAC container support (local playback)

Roku OS 5.0

Initial rollout date: June 5, 2013

Version 5.0 of the Roku OS was released to all second and later generation devices. The home screen introduces a completely new look and feel for navigating my apps, the app store, and settings. This release does not introduce any new screens or templates to the SDK.

New in this release

  • Updated home screen user interface

  • Increase Brightscript function limit beyond 1024

  • Miscellaneous fixes for gaming remotes

  • Memory improvements to the OS

  • Improved ECP security

Roku OS 4.9

Initial rollout date: November 12, 2012

New in this release

  • Roku billing - in-app subscription support in BrightScript

  • SMPTE TT CC (MP4, HLS, Smooth Streaming)

  • RoTextureManager 2D component

Roku OS 4.8

Initial rollout date: July 3, 2011

We've had our heads down working diligently on new firmware features and supporting new hardware. Hello Streaming Stick! In v4.8, we have some new developer SDK features to share with you. We are continuing our Roku OS version numbering scheme with v3.1 currently released to all "Classic" or "Roku1" models and major version 4.8 coming soon to all Roku2 models.

We are maturing as a company, and with that comes new legal requirements. In v4.8, we are asking our development community to agree to the development terms directly on the box before it can sideload and apps. As soon as your developer mode box updates to v4.8, you may find you are unable to sideload apps. You will need to re-enable developer mode by entering the following remote control sequence: 3x Home, 2x Up, Right, Left, Right, Left, Right. After entering "Enable Installer" on the secret screen, it will present you with the developer terms that you must read and scroll through and then click down to "I Agree". The box will then reboot with the sideloading installer enabled.

The Roku Team

New in this release

  • Internationalization and Localization support. (Currently localizing to en_US, fr_CA, es_ES, de_DE)
  • Smooth Streaming with PlayReady Support
  • In-app purchasing of new content, upgrades, features.
  • Native, fast ParseJSON() function.

Compatibility issues

Remember to re-enable developer mode in v4.8!

Roku OS 4.1

Initial rollout date: December 21, 2011

With v4.1, Roku is now supporting the “Roku 2” generation of boxes. We’ve tried to keep the Roku SDK compatible across all the different models and have highlighted hardware and SDK differences in a new Section 1.4 of the Developer Guide. Our Roku OS version numbering requires a little explanation as major version 3 is currently released to all “Classic” models and major version 4 is release to all “Currently Selling” models. We continue to have minor releases planned on both of these major release branches. All features from the v3.0 beta have made it into the final v3.0 and 4.1.

We understand that we haven’t exposed all the functionality the Roku 2 platform has to offer to the entire Roku Developer Community. Roku has a good track record of taking security issues seriously. There are many such issues to work through before we can expose low level OpenGL interfaces in a secure manner that the content owners in our community are also comfortable with. We are working diligently toward that end.

We appreciate all the hard work the Roku Developer Community has put into developing some great applications on the Roku platform. We are happy that the Roku 2 has been well received by the market and are looking forward to continued shared success with the Roku Developer Community and all the great new apps you can create.

New in this release

• Roku 2 platform support.
• Brightscript Plugin for Eclipse
• Updated videoPlayer sample application
• All v3.0 beta features are now fully supported on classic models running v3.0 and Roku 2 models running v4.1:

  • BrightScript v3.0 that includes:

    • performance improvements
    • typed values in function parameters and returns
    • improved auto-boxing and type promotion
    • explicit programmer controlled garbage collection
    • better statement stepping in source level debugger
    • collections can include intrinsic values rather than only objects
    • 2D Graphics APIs:
      • roScreen
      • roBitmap
      • roRegion
      • roCompositor
      • roSprite
      • roAudioResource
      • roFont
      • roFontRegistry
      • roFontMetrics

  • New Platform Components

    • roSocketAddress
    • roStreamSocket
    • roDataGramSocket
  • New ECP “input” command to pass user defined input parameters to your app.

Compatibility issues

Please note that we have deprecated support for Macrovision and WMV video. We still have support for CGMS (Copy Guard Management System) protection for analog outputs and HDCP protection for digital output. There has been very little use of WMV video, and if anyone has content out there it can be converted to MP4 with several transcoding applications, including ffmeg (please see our encoding guide for example usage).

Roku OS 3.0

Initial rollout date: April 18, 2011

We’re making the 3.0 Beta firmware available to all developers who request it. If your box isn’t already part of the developer beta group, send a private developer forum message to RokuKevin. Include the serial number of the Roku units you would like to run the 3.0 beta on.
It is very important that all developers regression test their applications on version 3.0 and note any incompatibilities. You may need to publish an update to your application to make it compatible with v3.0.

There are some exciting new features in the v3.0 SDK that will support developers building 2D games for the Roku box. We encourage all game developers to support both HD and SD modes. About half of the Roku’s out there still run in SD mode. We’ve added screen level scaling to support developers using one set of graphics assets and a single game engine running in both HD and SD modes. Although v3.0 has not been released to end users yet, we are now encouraging discussion about v3.0 features on the developer forum.

New in this release

  • BrightScript v3.0 that includes:

    • performance improvements
    • typed values in function parameters and returns
    • improved auto-boxing and type promotion
    • explicit programmer controlled garbage collection 
    • better statement stepping in source level debugger
    • collections can include intrinsic values rather than only objects

    • 2D Graphics APIs:

      • roScreen
      • roBitmap
      • roRegion
      • roCompositor
      • roSprite
      • roAudioResource
      • roFont
      • roFontRegistry
      • roFontMetrics

  • New Platform Components

    • roSocketAddress
    • roStreamSocket
    • roDataGramSocket
  • New ECP “input” command to pass user defined input parameters to your app.

The new 2D Graphics components are considered part of the core BrightScript language and are documented in the BrightScript Reference. The new platform components are documented in the Component Reference. New v3.0 components have their own sections and new methods on previously existing components are called out with their own “Since v3.0” sections.

Compatibility issues

BrightScript v3.0 is stricter in some ways than BrightScript v2.0. Areas in your app with variables that are used before initialized, or return statements that return a different type than specified in the function declaration may cause runtime errors in v.30 that may have run successfully in v2.0.

It is very important that all developers regression test their applications on version 3.0 and note any incompatibilities. You may need to publish an update to your application to make it compatible with v3.0.

Roku OS 2.9

Initial rollout date: March 31, 2011

With the release of firmware v2.9 build 1553, we are excited to share our latest Developer documentation. We have added several new features that developers can take advantage of. Many of you have already seen the new Premium Developer Program. With a premium developer account you can charge for applications in the Roku app store and Roku will handle the billing for you. To sign up for a premium developer account you simply need to provide your tax id and agree to the new terms and conditions. Our new v2.9 SDK helps support paid applications with the ability to launch the app store to purchase your application. You can create a free “Lite” app that includes a banner ad that up-sells to a premium app. When the user clicks on the ad, the “Buy” page is launched in the app store. There is an example of this in the roPosterScreen section of the component reference.

Please refer to the Component Reference Section 7 for an introduction to the two new components in v2.9. The roAudioMetadata component gives you access to metadata included in many audio files. It recognizes ID3 tags and supports cover art. The roImageMetadata component gives you access to metadata in image files.

Version 2.9 updates the grid component by letting the developer control the “Up” button behavior and giving developers the ability to stack grid screens without a lot of extraneous code.

Thanks for all you’ve developed so far. We’re looking forward to all the new ones you’re busy working on.

The Roku Team

New in this release

  • MKV playback on local USB devices.
  • Developer control of the Up button behavior on the top row of the Grid Screen.
  • Stackable Grid Screens.
  • Streaming Store can be launched to purchase “Premium” app from within “Lite” app
  • Get ID3 tags and other metadata from your audio files
  • Get EXIF and other metadata from your image files

New v2.9 components have their own section in the reference and new methods on previously existing components are called out with their own “Since v2.9” sections.

Roku OS 2.8

Initial rollout date: November 18, 2010

It’s been a short time since we last updated you, but we still have a few things worth sharing in this release of the SDK. We’ve added developer specified HLS stream switching strategies, new commands in the External Control API, and customizable GridScreen layouts.

We appreciate your support of the Roku platform and always welcome your feedback.
The Roku Team

New in this release

  • Developer controlled HLS stream switching strategies for improved playback ability.
  • Multiple Grid layouts: flat-movie, flat-portrait, flat-landscape, flat-square, and flat-16x9
  • Developer customized Grid Focused Border image, and Grid Descripton callout box image.
  • Use .png and .gif images as Grid posters.
  • Ability to get the Roku’s IPAddress within your app. This will enable the External Control API to be utilized directly within your app.

New v2.8 components have their own section in the reference and new methods on previously existing components are called out with their own “Since v2.8” sections.

Compatibility issues

We have maintained backward compatibility with the v2.7 SDK. Some have experienced video playback issues with their HLS streams. The number one issue was incorrect aspect ratios and resolutions. We’ve addressed most of these issues with a new v2.8 build (1158), but we have requested that any other HLS playback regression issues from v2.7 be posted to a sticky thread on our forum. We will attempt to address them all in a timely manner.

Roku OS 2.7

Initial rollout date: November 7, 2010

This release brings several new features to the Roku SDK, as well as support for the additional hardware capabilities of the new Roku models. The new models add 1080p playback capability and a new 12 button remote control. The new remote control will come with the Roku XD and Roku XDS. The Roku HD will continue to ship a 9 button remote. However, the 12 button remote will be available for purchase separately. The 12 button remote will also work on the older Roku models, providing the installed base access to the new button capabilities with only a remote control purchase. While not all users will have the 12 button remote, we are strongly encouraging developers to add support for the three new remote control buttons.

The “Instant Replay”, is implemented entirely in the Roku OS and will work on all apps during video playback without any changes to developer apps. The “Back” button works by default on most screens, but needs to be enabled on dialogs if the screen close behavior is desired. The “Info” button is intended to provide additional contextual information at various points within apps. It is up to developers to use the new features in the roMessageDialog and support the “Info” button usage pattern of launching context menus and dialogs. We have included a simpleinfo sample app in this release that illustrates the info button usage.

We are also introducing 1080p video playback support on the Roku XD and XDS models. Updated Information on supported encoding resolutions is included in the new Encoding Guide. We encourage developers to add 1080p streaming content at bitrates below 4.0Mbps.

A much anticipated addition to the SDK is the new roGridScreen component which presents the user with a scrolling grid as an alternative to the poster screen interface. The simplegrid sample app demonstrates how to use this new feature.

Below is the complete list of new features in this release.

We appreciate your support of the Roku platform and welcome your feedback.

New in this release

  • Support for new Remote Buttons - “Back”, “Instant Replay”, and “Info” buttons support ease of use, better trick play, and contextual menus.
  • 1080p playback support – When the user sets his display to 1080p, any content with meta data parameters for FullHD and a FrameRate of 24 or 30 will playback at 1080p 24 fps or 1080p 30 fps.
  • Grid Component – The grid screen enables users to easily navigate large collections of content.
  • External Control Protocol – The ability to control the Roku over the network. It’s now possible to create sophisticated iPhone, Android, and Blackberry apps.
  • Paragraph Screen Default Menu Item – You can now control the button that is highlighted on the paragraph screen so that selection dialogs work as expected.
  • Message Dialog Overlay Support – Expected to be popular when used in conjunction with the “Info” button to display contextual information.
  • Content Meta-Data parameters – New parameters provide more control over video playback: min/max bandwidth, and audio stream selection.
  • New Documentation Guides – The External Control Guide illustrates how to create remote control apps that work over the network. The Encoding Guide gives useful guidelines for encoding video content that is compatible with the Roku Streaming Player.
  • Simpleinfo sample application - shows how to use the roMessageDialog with overlay on top of a roPosterScreen when the “Info” button is pressed.
  • SimpleGrid sample application – shows how to use the roGridScreen component to display many rows of items.
  • AudioApp sample application – adds an application screensaver.

New v2.7 components have their own section in the reference and new methods on v2.4 components are called out with their own “Since v2.7” sections.

Compatibility issues

We have maintained backward compatibility with the v2.7 SDK. However, developers need to be aware of the new hardware models and update their apps to take advantage of the new features. If your back end services do any type of authentication based on model numbers, or you have any code that is based on model numbers you will need to update your code.

If any of your BrightScript code is enabling certain features based on model number, we have a new roDeviceInfo.HasFeature() method that will enable you to code this logic in a more forward-looking manner.If you don’t account for the new “Back” and “Info” buttons in your code, users may think your app does not behave correctly.

On most screens, the back button will automatically send an event that matches the isScreenClosed() predicate. However, this behavior would break many modal dialogs that do not expect to receive an isScreenClosed()event because they are waiting for a state change or reacting to user input that must be answered. We chose not to break these apps and instead did not enable the back button by default on the roMessageDialog component. We did provide a method to enable the back button on roMessageDialogs that can successfully handle an isScreenClosed() event. You should survey your app for any roMessageDialog components that should enable the back button with EnableBackButton(true). The “Info” button will enable you to pop-up any screen of your choosing. There are two new events added to support this new button. Events matching isButtonInfo()return the button focus of any on screen buttons in when the Info remote key is pressed. Events matching isListItemInfo()return the index of the focused poster when the Info remote key is pressed. The simpleinfo sample application shows basic support for the “Info” button that also demonstrates an overlay dialog on a poster screen. When isRemoteKey()events are propogated to your script, the event.GetIndex() for the Info key is 10.

Roku OS 2.6

Initial rollout date: June 28, 2010

The 2.6 SDK release adds a number of new components to the Roku Platform SDK and introduces a new user interface for developers on the Streaming Store for managing your apps.

The Streaming Store Developer Site now provides support for managing application dependencies based on minimum required Roku OS version or hardware capabilities. For example, if your application requires the features of a specific firmware release or a hardware feature, you can specify this dependency and ensure your application is only published to the correct systems. We recommend studying the App Packaging and Publishing Guide for more information about the Streaming Store versioning support.

We have added a number of new components to the SDK and expanded the API’s for some of our existing components. Be sure to check out the new roImageCanvas component, which allows much greater freedom for laying out custom types of screens. We’ve also added API’s to open up the USB port on the Roku XR for developers, support for HTTP Live Streaming, plus many other new features.

We hope you enjoy these new features and we’re anxious to see the new types of applications that you develop with these capabilities. Thanks again for your support.

Compatibility issues

The 2.6 SDK release adds additional events. Please be sure your event loops ignore unknown events. If your code is exiting event loops rather than just ignoring unknown events your application may have undefined behavior.

Important Notes

  • Please review the App Packaging and Publishing guide for more information about the new versioning support and how it impacts your application deployments in the Streaming Store.
  • We have changed the behavior of the Home remote control key. In v2.6, it now immediately kills your application and returns to the home screen. If your app was previously relying on a graceful application exit to do cleanup and bookkeeping, you will need to modify your application. You will want to modify your app to periodically update playback positions, positions in poster screens, search results, etc. This should not wait until application exit, as that could happen to you at any time.

New in this release

  • HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) – This is Roku’s implementation of Apple’s adaptive bitrate streaming solution. This feature provides support for both windowed, “live” and adaptive bit-rate VOD streaming capabilities.
  • Image Canvas Screen – A clean slate for creating custom screens. This object will allow you to place text and graphics wherever on the screen you desire. You can see an example in the SDK clock sample app.
  • Custom Font Support – Include your own TrueType (TTF) or Open Type (OTF) fonts in your application for use on the Image Canvas.
  • CA-Cert Bundle – For applications that refer to many different feeds, we’ve included a collection of CA-Certs that is the trusted set from the Firefox browser in a common filesystem. Any application can now easily trust this same set without increasing the size of its package.
  • Customizable Video Player – A video player that allows you play a video in a region on the screen and/or programmatically control playback. When used in conjunction with Image Canvas, you can combine video, images and text on a single screen.
  • USB support – For those of you that have Roku XR boxes or want to develop applications that make use of USB storage. Basic support for USB hotplug events and automounting of USB volumes is included in v2.6. Support for a variety of USB devices and the VFAT, NTFS, HFS and HFS Plus file systems.
  • File System access – You will be able to enumerate available file systems and access the content stored on them.
  • SRT subtitle support – If the content you are playing has an available SRT file for subtitles, enabling subtitle display will be as simple as specifying a path to the SRT file.
  • ScreenSavers – Create standalone screen saver applications that can run whenever the Roku Streaming Player is idle or create a custom screen saver for your app.
  • Perl-Compatible Regular Expressions – String manipulation just got a whole lot easier!
  • Application Logging Support – It’s now easier to gather statistics in your application and send them back to your own logging server.

There are lots of other changes in this release and these are just some highlights that we wanted to specifically mention. Please check the Component Reference for additional details. New v2.6 components have their own section in the reference and new methods on v2.4 components are called out with their own “Since v2.6” sections.

Roku OS 2.4

Initial rollout date: December 17, 2009

This release unites our Streaming Store development activities with the SDK. There are a few implications for developers during the transition that we’d like to highlight. Our legacy applications will not appear on the player until it syncs to our Streaming Store. The Streaming Store is not yet deployed in Production, so Netflix and Amazon will not appear on your player after the upgrade. These apps will eventually reappear on your players as the backend services are upgraded.

We’ve provided this firmware update early so that you have an opportunity to develop with this release before the Streaming Store beta is available. After you update your software build, the only features that will be visible on the home screen will be Settings and any developer application that you’ve installed manually. We plan to distribute at least one more SDK release before we get to feature complete for the launch, so we’re still adding more features and fixes on your behalf. We think that most of these enhancements are things that will be useful to a wide variety of developers.

Compatibility issues

There have been significant changes to our file system APIs. We’ve implemented these changes so that they are backward compatible for a limited time. Any deprecated API calls will be displayed in the debugger with a warning message. The samples applications were updated to use the new file specification format. Please refer to the BrightScript and Component Reference manuals for more information. Backward compatibility will be removed in the next release, so please update as soon as possible.

Update instructions

The Roku player will automatically update to the new version within the next 1-2 days.

We hope you force your player to download the new version immediately by following these steps
1) Press the HOME button on the remote control.
2) Use the arrow keys to highlight the “settings” icon and press the SELECT button.
3) Press the right arrow several times until you see “player info” and press SELECT.
4) Highlight “check for update” and press SELECT.
5) SELECT “yes”.
5) Wait for the software to download, and then SELECT “ok” to restart.
Note: If you already have the new version, a message will appear letting you know your version is current.

Important notes

  • This release includes new tools for packaging your application for deployment. Included in the SDK is the ChannelPackagingAndPublishing document. This document provides a step-by-step guide to the packaging process. Please be sure to review this document, since it will answer many questions about how applications will be deployed onto the Streaming Store.
  • The Streaming Store linking screen is included in this release and there are a few situations you could encounter it and get stuck. If you reset your box to factory defaults or change your network settings, this could occur. We don’t want you to link your box at this time, so we’ve provided the following instructions to help you bypass this screen if necessary.

Display the secret screen using the following key sequence:

Home 5x, FastForward 3x, Rewind 2x

After pressing this key sequence, the “secret screen” will appear. Select the “cycle channel store server” option until the text “<bypass account linking>” is displayed and then press the “back” button to exit the screen.

The software update options on this screen are controlled via the server and are not functional for developers. Just ignore these options, since they won’t work anyway.

New in this release

  • Documentation: There continue to be lots of changes to the documentation set, mostly to the Component Reference manual. The documentation has been reformatted with section numbers to make cross-referencing easier. New features have been added and additional details were provided on some video playback topics. The new file system changes are included as well as lots of API updates. There are several new docs in the set, such as the Channel Packaging and Publishing document mentioned above.
  • More Theme Attributes – We added quite a few more attributes changing colors within the UI. The paragraph and registration screens now support color attributes, as well as font color changes to the buttons and filter banners. These still work the same way as they have in the past and allow you to set an HTML Hex color value to override the default color scheme.
  • Flexible Image Scaling – We’ve added new scaling options for artwork that’s used in the Poster Screen, Slide Show or Banner Ads. The new options allow you to specify how you’d like odd-sized artwork scaled to file the destination area.
  • Image Styles – We’ve added additional styles to several screens for 16x9 and square aspect ratio artwork. There are more changes in the works in this area, which will be coming soon. Many of you have different size and aspect ratio artwork and providing more types of frames, plus better scaling capabilities will help to take advantage of all the existing artwork out there.
  • Display Mode API – Many developers have asked how they can find out the current display mode for the device. Check out the roDeviceInfo component for new APIs to access info about the users display settings.

There are lots of other changes in this release and these are just some highlights that we wanted to specifically mention. Please check the documentation for additional details.