ER: Allow server to accept IOSurfaceRef directly

[pizthewiz]

Not for naught, Syphon uses an IOSurfaceRef internally and it would be great if I could provide it directly instead of converting it to a texture first.

[vade]

TO be clear, you would want public API access to the internal IOSurface rather than the vended SyphonImage* pointer as a textureID associated with a context?

Can you be clear about your use case, and what / where you are limited now (just so we know).

[pizthewiz]

Sorry the other way around, I want to publish an IOSurfaceRef to a server, not pull one out of a client (though others might find that useful). In my specific use, I am pulling an IOSurfaceRef from a display stream and wonder if it would be advantageous to publish it to a SyphonServer without a texture conversion.

[bangnoise]

Not wholly against this, but two considerations if this becomes a thing:

1. Syphon conceptually presents a single live surface rather than a series of frames. Internally we reuse a single IOSurface (until frame resize) which gives it a considerable speed boost and cuts down on IPC
2. Syphon in the future may not always use IOSurface internally (eg over a network) and we should be mindful of adding complexity in that case

[pizthewiz]

My use case might be super specific and in turn, not worth the risk of exposing Syphon's internal details if that compromises or conflicts with future plans.

[bangnoise]

If so inspired you could create a modified version of the framework for your application - such a framework would work fine with existing clients.