Sometimes AVPlayer stalling and seekToTime: not respondin - ios

Question

I'm playing youtube videos using AVPlayer as follows,
- (void)startYoutubeVideoAtUrl:(NSURL *)videoUrl
{
NSLog(#"start player at url : %#", videoUrl);
[HCYoutubeParser h264videosWithYoutubeURL:videoUrl completeBlock:^(NSDictionary *videoDictionary, NSError *error) {
if (videoDictionary && videoDictionary.count > 0) {
NSString *URLString = [self chooseYoutubeUrlFromUrlList:videoDictionary];
AVURLAsset *asset = [AVURLAsset URLAssetWithURL:[self videoURLWithCustomScheme:#"streaming" uRLString:URLString] options:nil];
[asset.resourceLoader setDelegate:self queue:dispatch_get_global_queue(DISPATCH_QUEUE_PRIORITY_DEFAULT, 0)];
pendingRequests = [NSMutableArray array];
avPlayerItem = [AVPlayerItem playerItemWithAsset:asset];
[self startVideoPlayBack];
}
else {
[_delegate failedStartPalyInlineVideo];
}
}];
}
-(void)startVideoPlayBack
{
startTime = CFAbsoluteTimeGetCurrent();
avPlayer = [[AVQueuePlayer alloc] initWithPlayerItem:avPlayerItem];
avPlayerLayer = [AVPlayerLayer playerLayerWithPlayer:avPlayer];
[avPlayerItem addObserver:self forKeyPath:#"status" options:0 context:nil];
[avPlayerLayer addObserver:self forKeyPath:#"readyForDisplay" options:NSKeyValueObservingOptionNew context:nil];
avPlayerLayer.frame = CGRectMake(0, 0, self.view.frame.size.width, self.view.frame.size.height);
[self.view.layer addSublayer:avPlayerLayer];
[self watchApiCall];
avPlayer.actionAtItemEnd = AVPlayerActionAtItemEndNone;
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self
selector:#selector(playerItemDidReachEnd:)
name:AVPlayerItemDidPlayToEndTimeNotification
object:[avPlayer currentItem]];
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self
selector:#selector(playerItemPlaybackStalled:)
name:AVPlayerItemPlaybackStalledNotification
object:[avPlayer currentItem]];
- (void)observeValueForKeyPath:(NSString *)keyPath
ofObject:(id)object
change:(NSDictionary *)change
context:(void *)context
{
#try {
if (!avPlayer) {
return;
}
if (avPlayerItem.status == AVPlayerStatusReadyToPlay) {
}
else if (avPlayerItem.status == AVPlayerStatusFailed) {
NSLog(#"----- AVPlayerStatusFailed ----");
[self playbackVideo];
}
if (object == avPlayerLayer && [keyPath isEqualToString:#"readyForDisplay"]) {
[self resetNetworkSpeedUsingLoadingTime];
if (avPlayerLayer.readyForDisplay) {
id<LoopingVideoDelegate> strongDelegate = self.delegate;
if([strongDelegate readyForVideoDisplay]) {
[avPlayer play];
}
else {
[self removePlayer];
}
}
}
}
#catch(NSException *ex) {
NSLog(#"EXCEPTION : %#", ex);
}
}
My issue is some times the video getting stalled and fires AVPlayerItemPlaybackStalledNotification. Also it's not responding [avPlayerItem seekToTime:kCMTimeZero]; sometimes after called AVPlayerItemDidPlayToEndTimeNotification selector. I wasn't able to find a solution for this. I checked with,
[HCYoutubeParser thumbnailForYoutubeURL:videoUrl thumbnailSize:YouTubeThumbnailDefaultHighQuality completeBlock:^(UIImage *image, NSError *error) {
if (!error) {
[HCYoutubeParser h264videosWithYoutubeURL:videoUrl completeBlock:^(NSDictionary *videoDictionary, NSError *error) {
NSString *URLString = [self chooseYoutubeUrlFromUrlList:videoDictionary];
NSURL *urlToLoad = [NSURL URLWithString:URLString];
avPlayerItem = [[AVPlayerItem alloc] initWithURL:urlToLoad];
[self startVideoPlayBack];
}];
}
else {
NSLog(#"error in youtube parser");
}
}];
and there is no any player stall issue or seekToTime: not responding issue with that. Please help.

Answer 1

Observe your AVPlayerItem's loadedTimeRanges and seekableTimeRanges property to make make sure that the AVPlayer has loaded playable data yet. When steaming, the AVPlayer often pause falling short of playable(data that can be played by AVPlayer) data. This should help investigate further into the issue. You can also try to start playback when you get avPlayerItem.status == AVPlayerStatusReadyToPlay by calling play on your AVPlayer
From AV Foundation Programming Guide
Monitoring Playback
You can monitor a number of aspects of both the presentation state of a player and the player item being played. This is particularly useful for state changes that are not under your direct control. For example:
If the user uses multitasking to switch to a different application, a player’s rate property will drop to 0.0.
If you are playing remote media, a player item’s loadedTimeRanges and seekableTimeRanges properties will change as more data becomes available.
These properties tell you what portions of the player item’s timeline are available.
A player’s currentItem property changes as a player item is created for an HTTP live stream.
A player item’s tracks property may change while playing an HTTP live stream.
This may happen if the stream offers different encodings for the content; the tracks change if the player switches to a different encoding.
A player or player item’s status property may change if playback fails for some reason.
You can use key-value observing to monitor changes to values of these properties.