The May 2013 release of the Xbox One XDK from Microsoft contains the following new features, tools, and documentation. For features that shipped in a previous release of the Xbox One XDK, see the What’s New document for that release, available from Features Introduced in Previous Releases.
The most recent release notes for and updates to the Xbox One XDK can always be found on Xbox One XDK Software Downloads on the Xbox Game Developer site. For access, log in with your ID and password on https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/games/xbox/partner/index; at the top of the page, point to Development and click Downloads.
You can check with your account manager for the latest information about upcoming Xbox One XDK releases.
The current Xbox One XDK exclusively supports beta hardware. Also, all new features of Xbox Live will be available only to beta hardware.
Official support for alpha kits ended on May 1, 2013. As of this time, we no longer provide technical support for development with alpha kits nor guarantee that alpha kits can connect to Xbox Live.
NUI Lean Tracking
The May 2013 Xbox One XDK introduces “lean tracking”. Lean tracking makes it easy to incorporate a player’s lean to your experience. The value is pre-filtered for an optimal mix of stability and latency and is provided through a thumbstick-like interface. Side-to-side and front-to-back lean is supported, and it’s available through both the controller APIs (via the INuiBodyController interface) and the NUI APIs (Body.Lean Property).
Skeletal Tracking: Improved Tracking Quality while Seated
The May 2013 Xbox One XDK includes improved tracking quality while seated or crouched. The hips, spine, and knee joints are all significantly more accurate and reliable, along with overall body proportions while in these poses.
IPSec Support for Xbox Cloud Compute
The May 2013 Xbox One XDK introduces IPSec support for connecting between a console and Xbox Cloud Compute Game Server.
Pull Deployment Improvements
Pull Model deployment allows developers to make their titles available on the Xbox One console quickly compared to push deployment. The May 2013 Xbox One XDK includes performance improvements (compared to April 2013 XDK) to pull deployment as well as full Visual Studio integration.
Constrained Mode
In the May 2013 Xbox One XDK, titles can test Constrained Mode.
When running in Constrained mode, a Title is still loaded in memory and running, but has lost access to some resources. Titles will be placed in constrained mode when certain events occur, such as when the title loses focus and/or visibility, and the user is not engaging directly with the title, but with some other system experience. Titles can register for an event which notifies when the available resources to a title have changed.
There are two new xbapp commands which enable constrained mode testing. Xbapp constrain will pop up a dialog box and place the title into constrained mode for testing. Xbapp unconstrain will dismiss the pop up dialog box and return the title to the regular running state with full access to resources.
For this XDK release, constrained mode will take away CPU cores 4 and 5 from the title reservation. Threads which were scheduled on those 2 CPUs will be folded, and instead scheduled on the remaining CPUs in the title reservation (0-3). In a future XDK release, constrained mode will reduce the title’s GPU resource reservation to 45%.
For more information, please see the Durango PLM whitepaper, and refer to the PLM Xfest talk, both on GNDP.
Performance improvements for ACP/SHAPE
The May 2013 Xbox One XDK introduces significant performance improvements for ACP/SHAPE due to guest side caching and block updates.
Identity Runtime Improvements
In the May 2013 Xbox One XDK, the Identity Runtime in the May XDK contains multiple improvements. First, developers should notice reduced false positive identifications compared to the April XDK. Users should be misidentified less frequently throughout the system. Note that unenrolled users continue to be most frequently misidentified (compared to existing enrolled users). However, overall misidentifications should be significantly reduced. Additionally, the Identity Runtime is now significantly more resilient to variations in hair, particularly on children. Finally, bugs in pairing and biometric sign-in behavior have been fixed, resulting in increased reliability and consistency of functionality.
New Features and Update in Services APIs
The May 2013 Xbox One XDK introduces the following updates for the Windows.Xbox.Services APIs:
Speech Tools Improvements
The May 2013 Xbox One XDK includes improvements to the Speech Tools:
Aggregate Identity Token Support
In the May 2013 Xbox One XDK, X tokens now contain identities for the device, title, and all users currently signed in. The authorization header structure changes to XBL3.0 x=<user hash=””> ;<token> as a way to indicate which user the request is for. For more information, please see the forthcoming whitepaper “Understanding Security Tokens for Durango”.