Asset Hosting Services
Overview
Hosting Services provide an integrated facility for using Addressable Assets configuration data to serve packed content to local or network-connected application builds from within the Unity Editor. Hosting Services can improve iteration velocity when testing packed content and can also serve content to connected clients on local and remote networks.
Packed mode testing and iteration
Moving from Editor Play mode testing to platform application build testing introduces complexities and time costs to the development process. Hosting Services provide extensible Editor-embedded content delivery services that map directly to your Addressables group configuration. Using a custom Addressables profile, you can configure your application to load all content from the Unity Editor itself. This includes builds deployed to mobile devices, or any other platform, that have network access to your development system.
Setup
This article details the initial setup of Asset Hosting Services for your project. While the setup guide focuses on Editor workflows, you can use the API to configure Hosting Services by setting the HostingServicesManager property of the AddressableAssetSettings class.
Configuring a new Hosting Service
Use the Hosting window to add, configure, and enable new Hosting Services. In the Editor, select Window > Asset Management > Addressables > Hosting, or click the Tools > Window > Hosting Services button from the Addressables Groups window menu to access the Addressables Hosting window.
The Addressables Hosting window.
To add a new Local Hosting Service, click the Create > Local Hosting button.
Adding a new Hosting Service.
Note: For more information on implementing custom hosting service types, see the section on custom services.
The newly added service appears in the Hosting Services section of the Addressables Hosting window. Use the Service Name field enter a name for the service.
The new service defaults to the disabled state. To start the service, select the Enable check box.
The updated Addressables Hosting window after adding a service.
The HTTP Hosting Service automatically assigns a port number when it starts. The service saves the port number and reuses it between Unity sessions. To choose a different port, either assign a specific port number in the Port field, or click the Reset button to assign a different, random port number.
In Editor versions 2022.1 and above, HTTP downloads are disallowed by default. In order for the default HTTPHostingService to work correctly, you need to set the Allow downloads over HTTP setting in Edit > Project Settings... > Player > Other Settings > Allow downloads over HTTP to something other than Not allowed.
Warning
If you reset the port number, you must execute a full application build to generate and embed the correct URL.
Note
You may need to disable your local firewall or add exceptions to allow connections from mobile or other devices.
The HTTP Hosting Service is now enabled and ready to serve content from the directory specified in the remote BuildPath of each asset group.
Hosting Service profile setup
When working with Hosting Services during development, consider creating a profile that configures your asset groups to load from the Hosting Service. For more about profiles, see Addressable Assets Profiles.
Once in the Addressables Profiles window, create a new profile via Create > Profile. In the following example, the new profile is called "Editor Hosted".
Modify the remote loading URL to load from the Hosting Service. From the Addressables Hosting window, you can use the fields named [PrivateIpAddress] and [HostingServicePort] in the remote LoadPath variable to construct the path URL (for example, http://[PrivateIpAddress]:[HostingServicePort]).
Configuring the service's profile.
Verify that each group is configured correctly. Ensure that you set the BuildPath and LoadPath paths to their respective profile keys that you modified for use with Hosting Services. In this example, you can see how the profile variables in the LoadPath should be expanded to build a correct base URL for loading assets from Hosted Services.
Inspecting the service's load paths.
Tip
Use the Path Preview to verify that the profile variables resolve to the correct variables. The load path URL IP address and port must match those shown for the service on the Addressables Hosting window.
Finally, select the new profile from the Addressables Groups window, create a build, and deploy to the target device. The Unity Editor now serves all load requests from the application through the HttpHostingService service. You can now make additions and changes to content without redeployment. Rebuild the Addressable content, and relaunch the already deployed application to refresh the content.
Selecting a Hosting Service profile.
Batch mode
You can also use Hosting Services to serve content from the Unity Editor running in batch mode. To do so, launch Unity from the command line with the following options:
-batchMode -executeMethod UnityEditor.AddressableAssets.HostingServicesManager.BatchMode
This loads the Hosting Services configuration from the default AddressableAssetSettings object, and starts all configured services.
To use an alternative AddressableAssetSettings configuration, create your own static method entry point, to call through the HostingServicesManager.BatchMode(AddressableAssetSettings settings) overload.
Custom services
You can create a custom service to implement your own logic for serving content-loading requests from the Addressable assets system. For example:
- Support a custom IResourceProvider that uses a non-HTTP protocol for downloading content.
- Manage an external process for serving content that matches your production CDN solution (such as an Apache HTTP server).
Implementing a custom service
The HostingServicesManager can manage any class that implements an IHostingService interface (for more details on method parameters and return values, see the API documentation.
To create a new custom service:
- Follow the steps outlined in the configuring a new Hosting Service section above, but instead of selecting Create > Local Hosting button, select Create > Custom Service button instead.
- Drag the applicable script into its field, or select it from the object picker. The dialog validates that the selected script implements the IHostingService interface.
- To finish adding the service, click the Add button.
Moving forward, your custom service will appear in the Service Type drop-down options.
Adding a custom Asset Hosting Service.