Robin Raymond has put together a new draft that proposes the replacement of SDP O/A with a JavaScript Object API model within WebRTC.
The draft:
The WebRTC JavaScript Object API Rationale
Whereas:
The WebRTC JavaScript Object API & Shim document will be along shortly (days – not months).
We wanted to get this initial informational document out right away so everyone that has any interest would be able to review the concepts and comment before we get too far along on the actual API.
“No SDP Offer/Answer” is a concept that has been bantered about for some time. It continues to rear its ugly head within the IETF and W3C Working Groups. There is evidence that some major browser vendors will not back the current SDP O/A methodology at all, but some of us continue to pin our hopes and dreams on SDP O/A nonetheless.
We are told by the developers we need something that will not only pass muster with them but will also be something that can be extended and innovated upon, uninhibited by large browser vendors or any vendor for that matter.
According to many, real adoption of WebRTC will not happen if we continue to force everyone to use this SDP Offer/Answer methodology. It is clearly blocking our way forward and the amount of specification documentation remaining needed for the browser vendors to produce a compatible SDP based WebRTC engine in a browser is much more daunting than most are willing to admit.
It’s time for a change.
What does that mean? It means we need to rewrite a portion of the current WebRTC specification and WebRTC API, which also means that many of the demo apps running out there will need some level of modification. Which is O.K. It’s better to break a few demo apps now than to proceed knowing there is a material flaw in the design, precluding the rest of the web from playing along and causing untold pain in future development.
A WebRTC JavaScript Object API Model could mark a significant turning point in the history of WebRTC.
Long live WebRTC.
