Tag Archives: caf_sdk

Updates to Chromecast integrations with Interactive Media Ads



CAF DAI SDK Released

The Interactive Media Ads team is excited to announce that we’ve teamed up with the Cast Application Framework team to bring you the CAF DAI SDK, a fully supported solution for casting DAI video streams to Chromecast devices. This project is a complete rewrite of our original IMA SDK for Cast, significantly reducing the amount of code publishers need to write and streamlining the integration between the two SDKs.

The CAF DAI SDK provides a deep integration with Chromecast Application Framework's native Ad Breaks, meaning that adding around 30 lines of code to an existing CAF receiver can enable:
  • DAI support for both Live and VOD streams
  • Media queue management
  • Sender and receiver UI, including ad break markers
  • Bidirectional communications between sender and receiver
  • Skippable ad support on VOD streams

With the previous SDK, all of these functions required manual implementation.


A fully-featured CAF DAI integration



IMA SDK for Cast deprecated

As of December 13, 2021, both the client-side and DAI versions of the IMA SDK for cast are now deprecated. Publishers who are currently using the IMA SDK for cast to implement client-side advertisements are encouraged to migrate to using CAF native ad breaks. Publishers who are currently using the IMA SDK for cast to implement DAI advertisements are encouraged to migrate to the new CAF DAI SDK. These new implementation options offer publishers significantly simpler integrations with better stability and tighter integration with the entire cast ecosystem.
Advertisement Type Deprecated Solution Recommended Solution
Client Side IMA SDK for Cast CAF native ad breaks
DAI IMA SDK for Cast CAF DAI SDK

The Client side and DAI versions of the IMA SDK for Cast will continue to function for the foreseeable future but support and new development will be focused on the CAF DAI SDK moving forward. The IMA SDK team will continue to offer best attempt support for the deprecated SDKs through December of 2022, however, some limitations of the older platform may only be resolved by migrating to the new workflows described above.


We highly recommend that publishers who are currently using the older IMA SDK for Cast begin migrating to these new workflows for improved stability, simplified integration, and a much more polished developer experience.


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For more information about these changes, check out the developer documentation. If you have any issues migrating your integration from the IMA SDK for Cast to the CAF DAI SDK, feel free to reach out via our developer forums.