Add support for custom media receiver + sendMessage

[WeeJeWel]

Currently, it seems that only the media namespace is supported.

For my application, I have a custom media receiver with a message bus on a separate namespace (urn:x-cast:foo.bar).

I would like to be able to use sendMessage to send a message to the app running on the chromecast.

[jcarolus]

@WeeJeWel
Do you have a public receiver app that can be used for testing?

[WeeJeWel]

I will publish one for you that echoes back what has been sent asap.

…

Sent from my iPhone

On 26 May 2019, at 17:35, Jeroen Carolus ***@***.***> wrote: @WeeJeWel Do you have a public receiver app that can be used for testing? — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

[WeeJeWel]

I've created a sample application you can test it with. Source: https://github.com/WeeJeWel/chromecast-sandbox

Sender (for use in Chrome): https://weejewel.github.io/chromecast-sandbox/sender.html
App ID: 8CBC577D
Namespace: urn:x-cast:com.sandbox

If you need anything else, please let me know!

[jcarolus]

Is the receiver app accidentally pointed to the sender as well? It looks as if the Chromecast is also loading the sender.

[WeeJeWel]

I had that as well. A reboot of the Chromecast fixed it. Probably needed to refresh the list of app IDs or something like it.

[lochstar]

I'd like this as well. Should be able to get it added for the next release.

[jcarolus]

Ah yes - if something is published while your Chromecast is still on, funny.
My primary focus is on the media controller, @lochstar we could add a folder for the different receiver apps (one for the customData, one for this messaging)?

[lochstar]

I'll create a custom reciever that we can expand to handle our test cases. I don't think we'll need multiple. Leave this with me, I need this feature for one of my projects.

[WeeJeWel]

Hi guys. Anything I can do to help speed up development? I was hoping to get my hands dirty on my project this weekend :)

[lochstar]

Working on it. Are you after iOS or Android support first?

[WeeJeWel]

Eventually both but me personally first iOS.

[lochstar]

You can check out the custom-channel branch for the iOS work-in-progress. It has addChannel, removeChannel, & sendMessage functions added. See https://github.com/lochstar/nativescript-cast/blob/custom-channel/demo/app/main-view-model.ts#L122 for sample usage.

It requires a bit more testing and I'd like to create a custom reciever for the demo app. I'm also considering promisifying the functions.

[WeeJeWel]

Verrrry nice! I got it working in my project.

One odd thing I noticed: the didConnect method is executed immediately. So sending a message using cast.sendMessage(channel, ...) in the didConnect method crashes the app, because the const channel = cast.addChannel hasn't returned yet. Took me a while to figure that out.

Maybe actually wait for the connection, or else maybe put it in a nextTick.

Brilliant work so far!