Discuss Spatial Computing on Apple Platforms.

Posts under General subtopic

Post

Replies

Boosts

Views

Activity

Game Controller Input Limitations in visionOS Volumetric Windows - Need Clarification
Game Controller Input Limitations in visionOS Volumetric Windows Hello Apple Developer Community, I'm developing a game for visionOS and have encountered significant limitations with game controller input when using volumetric windows (WindowGroup with .volumetric style). I'd appreciate clarification on whether this is expected behavior and any guidance on best practices. 🧩 Issue Summary When using a DualSense controller with a volumetric window in visionOS, only a subset of controller inputs are available to the app. The remaining inputs appear to be reserved by the system for UI navigation. ✅ Working Inputs (Volumetric Window) D-Pad (all directions) L3 (left thumbstick button click) R3 (right thumbstick button click) Menu button Options button ❌ Not Working Inputs (Volumetric Window) Left thumbstick analog movement (used for UI scrolling instead) Right thumbstick analog movement (used for UI scrolling instead) Face buttons (Cross, Circle, Square, Triangle / A, B, X, Y) Shoulder buttons (L1, R1) Triggers (L2, R2) Key observation: When moving the left thumbstick in a volumetric window, the window's UI scrolls vertically instead of sending input to my app's GameController handlers. Similarly, face buttons seem to be reserved for system UI interactions. ⚙️ Implementation Details I'm using the standard GameController framework: Connect to controller via GCController.controllers() Access extendedGamepad profile Set up valueChangedHandler and pressedChangedHandler for all inputs Handlers confirmed registered via logging Working inputs (D-Pad, L3, R3) trigger immediately and consistently Non-working inputs (thumbsticks, face buttons) never trigger 🧠 Critical Finding: ImmersiveSpace Works Perfectly When testing the exact same code in an ImmersiveSpace (.mixed immersion style), all controller inputs work perfectly: ✅ Both thumbsticks provide full analog input ✅ All face buttons trigger their handlers ✅ All shoulder buttons and triggers work correctly ✅ 100% success rate with no intermittent issues This suggests the issue isn't with my code, but rather how visionOS handles controller input differently between Volumetric Windows and ImmersiveSpace. 🧪 Test Environment I created a minimal test project (Controller-Playground) to isolate the issue: A simple ControllerTester class that registers all GameController handlers A visual UI showing real-time input state No game logic, RealityKit physics, or other complexity Results In volumetric window: Only D-Pad, L3, R3, Menu, Options work In ImmersiveSpace: All inputs work perfectly This confirms the limitation exists at the visionOS platform level, not in app code. 🧰 Attempted Workarounds I tried the following without success: Setting GCSupportsControllerUserInteraction = false in Info.plist Setting UIRequiresFullScreen = true Changing window styles (.plain, .volumetric) Polling vs. handler-based input approaches Various threading models (MainActor, separate thread) Result: The only way to enable full controller support is to switch to ImmersiveSpace. ❓ Questions for Apple Is this input reservation behavior in volumetric windows intended and documented? Are game controllers expected to have limited functionality in volumetric windows while full functionality is reserved for ImmersiveSpace? Is there a way to request full controller input access in a volumetric window, or is ImmersiveSpace the only option for complete controller support? Where can I find official documentation about controller input differences between window types? Are there any APIs or configuration options to disable system controller shortcuts in volumetric windows? 🎯 Impact This limitation has a significant effect on game design and architecture: Volumetric windows offer a multitasking-friendly, less immersive experience ImmersiveSpace provides full controller support but may be more immersive than some games require Games that only need basic D-Pad and button input can work fine in volumetric windows Games requiring analog sticks or face buttons must currently use ImmersiveSpace It would be very helpful if Apple could clarify or reference existing documentation regarding controller input handling in different visionOS window types. If such documentation doesn't exist yet, it might be valuable to include this information in future developer guides or best-practice documents. 🕹 Current Workaround For now, I'm using: D-Pad for character movement (digital 8-direction) R3 (right stick click) as a substitute for the "X" button This setup allows the game to function within a volumetric window, though full controller support still requires ImmersiveSpace. 📄 Request If this is expected behavior, I may have simply missed the relevant documentation — could you please point me to any existing resources that explain this design? If there isn't one yet, it would be great if future visionOS documentation could: Clearly outline controller input behavior across window types Provide guidance on when to use Volumetric Windows vs. ImmersiveSpace for games Consider adding an API option to request full controller access when appropriate If this is not expected behavior, I'm happy to file a detailed bug report with sample code. 💻 System Information visionOS: Latest Simulator Xcode: Latest version Controller: Sony DualSense Framework: GameController (standard extendedGamepad profile) Test project: Minimal reproducible example available Thank you for any clarification or guidance you can provide. This information would be valuable for many developers working on visionOS games.
1
0
541
Oct ’25
how to transition between spatial3d to spatial3DImmersive?
Hi, When viewing a spatial photo scene on the Apple Vision Pro Photos app, you can tap on the immersive icon on the top right corner to transaction from the window presenting the image as spatial3d to an immersive photo scene with spatial3DImmersive where the window borders disappear. Could someone explain how to achieve that? I tried to do it but once I transition from spatial3d to spatial3DImmersive I can see still see a rectangle around the spatial image. Thanks.
1
0
829
4w
Missing Properties in BillboardComponent
In an earlier beta, BillboardComponent had rotationAxis and upDirection properties which allowed more fine-grained control of how an entity rotates towards the camera. Currently, it is only possible to orient the z axis of the entity. Looking at the robot in the documentation, the rotation of its z axis causes its feet to lift off the ground. Before, it was possible to restrain the rotation to one axis (y, for example) so that the robot's feet stayed on the ground with billboard.upDirection = [0, 1, 0] billboard.rotationAxis = [0, 1, 0] Is there an alternative way to achieve this? Are these properties (or similar) coming back?
1
0
294
Mar ’25
Dynamically assigning texture resource to ShaderGraphMaterial on VisionOS
I implemented a ShaderGraphMaterial and tried to load it from my usda scene by ShaderGraphMaterial.init(name: in: bundle). I want to dynamically set TextureResource on that material, so I wanted to expose texture as Uniform Input of a ShaderGraphMaterial. But obviously RCP's Shader Graph doesn't support Texture input as parameter as the image shows: And from the code level, ShaderGraphMaterial also didn't expose a way to set TexturesResources neither. Its parameterNames shows an empty array if I didn't set any custom input params. The texture I get is from my backend so it really cannot be saved into a file and load it again (that would be too weird). Is there something I am missing?
1
0
546
Jan ’25
AR QuickLook Frame Rate Questions
When I've made an animated UDSZ, at what framerate will the animation be rendered in QuickLook? Is it the same across all devices? (iPhone, Apple Vision Pro, etc.) and viewing environments? (QuickLook, inside an ARView, etc.) Suppose I export my file at 30fps and the device draws at 60fps, does the device interpolate between frames automatically, animate at a lower frame rate, or play it at twice the speed? What if it were 24fps? My primary concern with understanding frame rates is a bit of trouble I've had making perfectly looping animations. There always seems to be the slightest stutter between iterations. Thanks in advance for any insights you're able to provide!
1
0
250
Mar ’25
generateConvex(from mesh: MeshResource) crashes instead of throwing a Swift error
I have a MeshResource and I would like to create a collision component from it. let childBounds = child.visualBounds(relativeTo: self) var childShape: ShapeResource do { // Crashed by the following line instead of throwing a Swift Error childShape = try await ShapeResource.generateConvex(from: childModel.mesh); } catch { childShape = ShapeResource.generateBox(size: childBounds.extents) childShape = childShape.offsetBy(translation: childBounds.center) } Based on this document: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/realitykit/shaperesource/generateconvex(from:)-6upj9 Will throw an error if mesh does not define a nonempty convex volume. For example, will fail if all the vertices in mesh are coplanar. But, the method crashes the app instead of throwing a Swift error Incident Identifier: 35CD58F8-FFE3-48EA-85D3-6D241D8B0B4C CrashReporter Key: FE6790CA-6481-BEFD-CB26-F4E27652BEAE Hardware Model: Mac15,11 ... Version: 1.0 (1) Code Type: ARM-64 (Native) Role: Foreground Parent Process: launchd_sim [2057] Coalition: com.apple.CoreSimulator.SimDevice.85A2B8FA-689F-4237-B4E8-DDB93460F7F6 [1496] Responsible Process: SimulatorTrampoline [910] Date/Time: 2025-01-26 16:13:17.5053 +0800 Launch Time: 2025-01-26 16:13:09.5755 +0800 OS Version: macOS 15.2 (24C101) Release Type: User Report Version: 104 Exception Type: EXC_BREAKPOINT (SIGTRAP) Exception Codes: 0x0000000000000001, 0x00000001abf841d0 Termination Reason: SIGNAL 5 Trace/BPT trap: 5 Terminating Process: exc handler [17316] Triggered by Thread: 0 Thread 0 Crashed: 0 CoreRE 0x1abf841d0 REAssetManagerCollisionShapeAssetCreateConvexPolyhedron + 232 1 CoreRE 0x1abf845f0 REAssetManagerCollisionShapeAssetCreateConvexPolyhedronFromMesh + 868 2 RealityFoundation 0x1d25613bc static ShapeResource.generateConvex(from:) + 148 Here is the message on the app console from Xcode /Library/Caches/com.apple.xbs/Sources/REKit_Sim/ThirdParty/PhysX/physx/source/physxcooking/src/convex/QuickHullConvexHullLib.cpp (935) : internal error : QuickHullConvexHullLib::findSimplex: Simplex input points appers to be coplanar. Failed to cook convex mesh (0x3) assertion failure: 'convexPolyhedronShape != nullptr' (REAssetManagerCollisionShapeAssetCreateConvexPolyhedron:line 356) Bad parameters passed for convex mesh creation. Message from debug The above crash happened on a visionOS simulator (visionOS 2.2 (22N840)
1
0
430
Jan ’25
Unable to Retain Main App Window State When Transitioning to Immersive Space
In Vision OS app, I have two types of windows: Main App Window – This is the default window that launches when the app starts. It displays the video listings and other primary content. Immersive Space Window – This opens only when a user starts streaming or playing a video. Issue: When entering the immersive space, the main app window remains visible in front of it unless manually closed. To avoid this, I currently close the main window when transitioning to immersive space and reopen it when exiting from immersive space. However, this causes the app to restart instead of resuming from its previous state. Desired Behavior: I want the main app window to retain its state and seamlessly resume from where it was before entering immersive mode, rather than restarting. Attempts & Challenges: Tried managing opacity, visibility but none worked as expected. Couldn’t find a way to push the main window to the background while bringing the immersive space to the foreground. Looking for a solution to keep the main window’s state intact while transitioning between immersive and normal modes.
1
0
75
Mar ’25
Persistent Entity Position
I want to let users place 2D/3D “artworks” on detected walls and have them reappear in exactly the same real‑world spot after quitting and relaunching the app (like widgets do, but for my own entities).Environment: Xcode 26, visionOS 2.0, RealityKit + ARKitSession/WorldTrackingProvider Entities are parented to a holder that’s aligned to a wall via plane/mesh raycasts. What I’ve tried: Create a WorldAnchor at placement, save UUID + full 4×4 transform On next launch, re-create the WorldAnchor (or set the saved transform) and attach the entity Gate restore on relocalization/mesh updates and disable all raycast/search after restore Issue: After relaunch, placement still resolves relative to current device pose, not the same wall position. Questions: Is there a public API in visionOS 2.0 to persist app‑managed world anchors across sessions (room‑fixed), e.g., AnchorStore or equivalent? If not, what’s the recommended pattern to reliably restore wall‑anchored content? Are persistence features mentioned for widgets/windows available to third‑party RealityKit entities?
1
0
218
Oct ’25
visionOS Widget Bug
When I was developing the visionOS 26beta Widget, I found that it could not work normally when the real vision OS was running, and an error would appear. Please adopt container background api It is worth mentioning that this problem does not occur on the visionOS virtual machine. Does anyone know what the reason and solution are, or whether this is a visionOS error that needs Feedback? Thank you!
1
0
396
Sep ’25
I am developing a Immersive Video App for VisionOs but I got a issue regarding app and video player window
In Vision OS app, We have two types of windows: Main App Window – This is the default window that launches when the app starts. It displays the video listings and other primary content. Immersive Space Window – This opens only when a user starts streaming or playing a video. Issue: When entering the immersive space, the main app window remains visible in front of it unless manually closed. To avoid this, I currently close the main window when transitioning to immersive space and reopen it when exiting. However, this causes the app to restart instead of resuming from its previous state. Desired Behavior: I want the main app window to retain its state and seamlessly resume from where it was before entering immersive mode, rather than restarting. Attempts & Challenges: Tried managing opacity, visibility, and state preservation, but none worked as expected. Couldn’t find a way to push the main window to the background while bringing the immersive space to the foreground. Looking for a solution to keep the main window’s state intact while transitioning between immersive and normal modes.
1
0
120
Mar ’25
CapturedRoom.Section is missing a lot of information
The Section struct only publicly makes the center property available, but this is a SIMD3 that doesn't seem to line up with the rest of the model. All other objects have a 4x4 transform matrix that accurately gives each position and rotation. When inspecting a Section in the debugger, many more properties are visible such as polygon and transform. Why are these not visible? The transform in particular seems necessary to make any sort of use of the Sections.
1
0
355
Sep ’25
Degraded RoomPlan performance
We have been using RoomPlan in our app for 2+ years. Through a combination of in-app and manual coaching on scanning best practices, most users are able to achieve high-quality scans on a consistent basis. In recent weeks, however, we have observed an increase in reports of degraded scanning performance, even from veteran users who had not previously encountered issues. The RoomCaptureView overlay is jittery and crooked, and the resulting scan file has significant issues, even for simple, well-lit rectangular rooms. It is difficult to troubleshoot these issues given the number of variables at play, and the overall volume of reports is still relatively low, but we'd appreciate any guidance on known issues or workarounds that could help unblock our users who are being affected by this. I noticed that this post includes an acknowledgement of FB14454922 and FB15035788. Our issues seem slightly different as the scans are simply inaccurate and jittery without failing outright. I haven't found any other threads on similar issues.
1
1
524
5d