Support custom graphics from Blazor components across all hosting models

[danroth27]

We've seen user requests to support custom graphics in Blazor components that can be reused across all Blazor hosting models: Server, WebAssembly, Hybrid. For example: mono/SkiaSharp#1834

SkiaSharp provides some level of custom graphics support for Blazor WebAssembly apps, but additional work is required to support Server and Hybrid scenarios where the canvas memory is not directly accessible.

Microsoft.Maui.Graphics provides a common graphics abstraction for .NET MAUI apps. It supports using a skia-based backend when can also work in Blazor WebAssembly apps: https://github.com/jonlipsky/MauiGraphics.Sample.Blazor.WebAssembly. But again, no support for Server or Hybrid.

Various community projects existing for interacting with the HTML canvas API: https://github.com/excubo-ag/Blazor.Canvas, https://github.com/BlazorExtensions/Canvas.

To support Blazor Server and Blazor Hybrid we need to decide on a mechanism to transfer the graphics commands to the browser and then handle them. See mono/SkiaSharp#1834 (comment) for some options.

[RChrisCoble]

Thanks for this nice writeup @danroth27. I know @jonlipsky mentioned in an email conversation he already had code to serialize and deserialize drawing commands with a binary format for MAUI.Graphics which might be helpful if that behavior is ever committed.

[danroth27]

Related Microsoft.Maui.Graphics issues:

• Blazor WebAssembly support for Microsoft.Maui.Graphics Microsoft.Maui.Graphics#243
• Blazor Server support for Microsoft.Maui.Graphics Microsoft.Maui.Graphics#244
• Blazor Hybrid support for Microsoft.Maui.Graphics Microsoft.Maui.Graphics#245

[RChrisCoble]

@danroth27 has communicated this will not reach the priority level for .NET 8. The P3 tag aligns against that decision. Thanks for the update.