Handle streaming events with AVPlayer

Question

I'm building an app which plays an audio stream (from a webradio).

I'm using AVPlayer for it.

I'd like to know how you would handle AVPlayer's "buffering" when the connection is slow or when the user just clicked "play". I want to detect that AVPlayer is "buffering" to display an UIActivityIndicatorView.
Same question while running in the background. What should I do if buffering in this case?

score 27 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

For the first question

You can refer to my answer on this topic ios avplayer trigger streaming is out of buffer

For the second

Here is how I solved this same problem:

Inside where you handle the event for buffer empty add this code:

    if (object == playerItem && [keyPath isEqualToString:@"playbackBufferEmpty"])
    {
        if (playerItem.playbackBufferEmpty) {
            [[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] postNotificationName:@"message" object:@"Buffering..."];
            
            if([[UIApplication sharedApplication] applicationState] == UIApplicationStateBackground)
            {
                task = [[UIApplication sharedApplication] beginBackgroundTaskWithExpirationHandler:^(void) {
                }];
            }
        }
    }

Now you will have to stop this background task after your buffer is ready to go again:

if (object == playerItem && [keyPath isEqualToString:@"playbackLikelyToKeepUp"])
{
    if (playerItem.playbackLikelyToKeepUp)
    {
        [player play];
        
        if([[UIApplication sharedApplication] applicationState] == UIApplicationStateBackground)
        {
            [[UIApplication sharedApplication] endBackgroundTask:task];
            task = 0;
        }
    }
}

ps: task is declared on my .h file as UIBackgroundTaskIdentifier task;

This happens because when your application is in background and for some reason your stream is halted iOS will terminate your player and you will not be able to continue once you start receive streaming again. So with this we can cheat on iOS to make it think that your player is still working. — sciasxp, Nov 14 '11 at 03:06
Do you need anything inside your task block? Or does that exist just to keep a loop running on the app delegate? — quantumpotato, May 25 '12 at 19:16

score 10 · Answer 2 · edited Sep 26 '11 at 19:08

10

I have found the solution to this problem.

if (self.avPlayer.currentItem.playbackLikelyToKeepUp == NO) 
{
    // Show activity indicator
}

edited Sep 26 '11 at 19:08

pablasso

2,479
2
26
32

answered Jul 02 '11 at 09:13

Nir

399
3
22

3

What method did you put that in? – Ruben Martinez Jr. Aug 01 '14 at 19:09
Ruben Martinez Jr - use timer for check (1 sec optimal) , on KeepUp ==YES timer.invalidate() – Nikola Lukic Sep 22 '16 at 12:41

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered May 17 '17 at 16:32

For Swift 3

This works fine for me, maybe it can help, call self?.bufferState() inside addPeriodicTimeObserver

    private func bufferState() {
    if let currentItem = self.avPlayer.currentItem {
        if currentItem.status == AVPlayerItemStatus.readyToPlay {
            if currentItem.isPlaybackLikelyToKeepUp {
                print("Playing ")
            } else if currentItem.isPlaybackBufferEmpty {
                print("Buffer empty - show loader")
            }  else if currentItem.isPlaybackBufferFull {
                print("Buffer full - hide loader")
            } else {
                print("Buffering ")
            }
        } else if currentItem.status == AVPlayerItemStatus.failed {
            print("Failed ")
        } else if currentItem.status == AVPlayerItemStatus.unknown {
            print("Unknown ")
        }
    } else {
        print("avPlayer.currentItem is nil")
    }
}

score 0 · Answer 4 · answered Sep 24 '15 at 09:04

Try this:

AVPlayerItem* mPlayerItem;

if(context == AVPlayerDemoPlaybackViewControllerCurrentItemBufferEmptyContext) 
{
    if (object == self.mPlayerItem && [path isEqualToString:@"playbackBufferEmpty"]) 
    {
        if (self.mPlayerItem.playbackBufferEmpty)
        {
            playBufferEmpty = TRUE;
            [indicator startAnimating];
            [vidStreaminglabel setText:@"Buffering..."];
            [vidStreaminglabel setHidden:NO];
        }
    }
}

else if(context == AVPlayerDemoPlaybackViewControllerCurrentItemPlayBackBufferFullContext)
{
    if (object == mPlayerItem && [path isEqualToString:@"playbackBufferFull"]){
        if (self.mPlayerItem.playbackBufferFull) {
            [mPlayer play];
        }
    }
}

else if (context == AVPlayerDemoPlaybackViewControllerCurrentItemPlayBackLikelyToKeepUpContext)
{
    if (object == mPlayerItem && [path isEqualToString:@"playbackLikelyToKeepUp"])
    {
         if(self.mPlayerItem.playbackLikelyToKeepUp)
         {
             // Autoplay after buffer 
             if(!(mRestoreAfterScrubbingRate != 0.f || [self.mPlayer rate] != 0.f))
             {
                 if (self.presentingViewController) {
                     [mPlayer play];
                 }

                 playBufferEmpty = FALSE;
                 [indicator stopAnimating];
                 [vidStreaminglabel setHidden:YES];
             }
        }
    }
}

What is context and where does it come from? Can you please include the method declaration and / or calls? — Julian F. Weinert, Oct 31 '15 at 12:06
Please give proper explanation Don't waste time of others !! — Sumit singh, Oct 06 '17 at 12:16

Handle streaming events with AVPlayer

4 Answers4

For the first question

For the second