The session framework is a framework for building products on Fuchsia. The framework provides software libraries, FIDL protocols, developer tools, and standards to help product owners build their product's user experience.
A session is a component that encapsulates a product’s user experience. It is the first product-specific component started on boot. There is only one session component, but it can be composed of many sub-components. For example, the session for a graphical product instantiates Scenic (graphics) as a child component.
At runtime, the session manager (the component that starts the session) offers capabilities (e.g., storage, network access, and hardware protocols) to the session which the session uses to construct the product experience.
The session manager serves as the boundary between platform components that are present on all Fuchsia products, and product components that are present only on a subset of Fuchsia products.
The diagram above depicts a running Fuchsia product. The component_manager instantiates several different platform components, including session_manager. session_manager then launches the session for the given product configuration, and the session instantiates its own, product-specific, component hierarchy.
Even for simple products, the session ends up with a lot of responsibilities. For example, it configures the scene graph, wires up input, integrates accessibility, and so on. The session framework helps the session fulfill these responsibilities by:
Client libraries implement common functionality across sessions. For example, input tracks available input devices, maintains device state, and allows sessions to register handlers for events. In the diagram below, the session includes an input library that talks to the available input devices. The session instantiates Scenic as a child component, and adds an input handler to the input pipeline that sends events to Scenic directly.
Another example is the scene_management library. This library provides utilities for managing a scene graph. For example, a session that displays views from different components can use scene_management to set up an appropriately configured scene and present the component views.
Not all sessions are written in a language supported by the session framework’s client libraries. In these cases, the session can instantiate components (provided by the session framework) that wrap the library and expose FIDL protocols with an API surface similar to the wrapped library.
In the diagram above, the session instantiates an input component and speaks to it via an input protocol. The session also instantiates Scenic, and makes sure that Scenic and the appropriate services are routed between Scenic and the input component.
FIDL Protocols defined by the session framework help sessions consistently integrate content from different runtimes (e.g., Flutter, web). Additionally, these protocols help reduce the burden product owners experience when integrating new runtimes into their products.
Consider a session child component that displays content to the user when it receives a ping from the network. The session offers the network-listening component the ElementManager FIDL protocol. The ElementManager protocol allows components to add other components as children of the session at runtime. The network listener then calls ElementManager.proposeElement to add an Element (i.e. a component) to the session.
If the session accepts the request, the component is instantiated:
Since the element proposer and the session use a protocol that is defined by the session framework, the same element proposer can be used across all sessions that implement the ElementManager protocol.
