Berkelium

Berkelium is a library that provides off-screen browser rendering via Google's open source Chromium.

Quick links:

• The BSD licensed source code is available from Github
• Questions not answered here? Developer communication channels are shared with Sirikata so feel free to reach out there
• Video and screenshots of Berkelium running inside Sirikata

FAQ

Further questions are being asked and answered in the Ogre Showcase forum thread as well as the Berkelium announcement blog post comment section.

Q: Does Berkelium work a standalone independently of Sirikata?

A: Yes and we hope that you will consider us! You can incorporate it into any project to get a simple, easy to use API for off-screen web browsers.

Q: Are plugins supported?

A: Berkelium should support plugins, but currently that support is limited to Flash (on all platforms). Hopefully many needs will be addressed by new features in HTML5. For those that aren't, we believe Flash is able to fill the gap. For the curious with some spare time, it may be possible to use a hooked HDC on Windows, and to use the X11 Composite extension to render plugins to OpenGL on Linux. However, we suspect enabling arbitrary plugins and programs in this way would take a good month of work to get right.

Q: How is Berkelium used in Sirikata?

A: We've started using it to allow arbitrary 3d objects to contain browsers, and in the future, objects may be able to run a user interfaces and even entire object scripts within the sandbox of a browser window.

Q: Which operating systems does Berkelium run under?

A: Windows, Mac & Linux.

Q: What can Berkelium be used for?

A: Berkelium may be used as a full-fledged browser in a 3d environment, for UIs in games, to run object scripts in a sandbox. The 3d browser is a convenient way to gain access to the multitude of collaborative applications already developed for the web, such as video chat using flash, or document editing using EtherPad.