ios5 - Creating an image out of the ios surface and saving it

Question

I am trying to acquire the surface associated with the main screen of the ios device, create an image out of it and save it. This is in relevance to this question - Taking Screenshots from iOS app - emulating Display recorder (query on the internals).
The code is as follows:

    IOMobileFramebufferConnection connect;
    kern_return_t result;

    io_service_t framebufferService = IOServiceGetMatchingService(kIOMasterPortDefault, IOServiceMatching("AppleH1CLCD"));
    if(!framebufferService)
        framebufferService = IOServiceGetMatchingService(kIOMasterPortDefault, IOServiceMatching("AppleM2CLCD"));
    if(!framebufferService)
        framebufferService = IOServiceGetMatchingService(kIOMasterPortDefault, IOServiceMatching("AppleCLCD"));

    result = IOMobileFramebufferOpen(framebufferService, mach_task_self(), 0, &connect);

    result = IOMobileFramebufferGetLayerDefaultSurface(connect, 0, &screenSurface);

    uint32_t aseed;
    IOSurfaceLock(screenSurface, kIOSurfaceLockReadOnly, &aseed);
    uint32_t width = IOSurfaceGetWidth(screenSurface);
    uint32_t height = IOSurfaceGetHeight(screenSurface);

    CFMutableDictionaryRef dict;
    int pitch = width*4, size = 4*width*height;
    int bPE=4;
    char pixelFormat[4] = {'A','R','G','B'};
    dict = CFDictionaryCreateMutable(kCFAllocatorDefault, 0, &kCFTypeDictionaryKeyCallBacks, &kCFTypeDictionaryValueCallBacks);
    CFDictionarySetValue(dict, kIOSurfaceIsGlobal, kCFBooleanTrue);
    CFDictionarySetValue(dict, kIOSurfaceBytesPerRow, CFNumberCreate(kCFAllocatorDefault, kCFNumberSInt32Type, &pitch));
    CFDictionarySetValue(dict, kIOSurfaceBytesPerElement, CFNumberCreate(kCFAllocatorDefault, kCFNumberSInt32Type, &bPE));
    CFDictionarySetValue(dict, kIOSurfaceWidth, CFNumberCreate(kCFAllocatorDefault, kCFNumberSInt32Type, &width));
    CFDictionarySetValue(dict, kIOSurfaceHeight, CFNumberCreate(kCFAllocatorDefault, kCFNumberSInt32Type, &height));
    CFDictionarySetValue(dict, kIOSurfacePixelFormat, CFNumberCreate(kCFAllocatorDefault, kCFNumberSInt32Type, pixelFormat));
    CFDictionarySetValue(dict, kIOSurfaceAllocSize, CFNumberCreate(kCFAllocatorDefault, kCFNumberSInt32Type, &size));

    IOSurfaceRef destSurf = IOSurfaceCreate(dict);
    IOSurfaceAcceleratorRef outAcc;
    IOSurfaceAcceleratorCreate(NULL, 0, &outAcc);

    CFDictionaryRef ed = (__bridge CFDictionaryRef)[NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys: nil];
    IOSurfaceAcceleratorTransferSurface(outAcc, screenSurface, destSurf, ed, NULL);

    IOSurfaceUnlock(screenSurface, kIOSurfaceLockReadOnly, &aseed);

    CGDataProviderRef provider = CGDataProviderCreateWithData(NULL, IOSurfaceGetBaseAddress(destSurf), (width*height*4), NULL);
    CGImageRef cgImage=CGImageCreate(width, height, 8, 8*4, IOSurfaceGetBytesPerRow(destSurf), CGColorSpaceCreateDeviceRGB(), kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipFirst | kCGBitmapByteOrder32Little, provider, NULL, YES, kCGRenderingIntentDefault);
    UIImage *image = [UIImage imageWithCGImage: cgImage];
    CGImageRelease(cgImage);
    UIImageWriteToSavedPhotosAlbum(image, self, nil, nil);

But all I get is a blank image saved in my photos folder. Please help on what part am I going wrong. Thanks.

Answer 1

I remember I saw something on this subject (taking screenshots in the background) some time ago. I wasn't able find exact place and code which I saw. The only note which I left for myself was usage of createScreenIOSurface

I googled a little bit and found couple of mentions:

Get a screenshot while App is in background? (Private APIs allowed)

https://github.com/rpetrich/FastBlurredNotificationCenter/blob/master/Tweak.x

http://pastie.org/pastes/3734430

As I remember the code was way more compact then what you showed.