Autoplay-detection for video crashes on iOS7 when added to homescreen

[wibron]

When I add my app to the homescreen via Safari, it crashes when I open the app. If I uncomment the Modernizr script-tag the app doesn't crash.

My build-config:

{
  "classPrefix" : "",
  "options": [
    "setClasses",
    "testProp"
  ],
  "feature-detects": [
    "test/video/autoplay"
  ]
}

Tested on iPhone 4S, iPad Mini Wifi with iOS 7.0

[paulirish]

can you report this at bugreport.apple.com ?

you should be able to get a error dump from the simulator too.

[patrickkettner]

Also, would you happen to know which version of ios 7 this is? The GM, or one of the builds

[wibron]

@paulirish Actually, I can't reproduce this in the simulator. Crashes on iPhone 5 and 4S with the GM.

[stucox]

Any chance it's related to #945, i.e. trying to load an unsupported video format? iOS doesn't support Ogg either.

[patrickkettner]

I really doubt it, since Modernizr.video.h264 should be working, but I will check out to make sure.

[ryanseddon]

Confirmed to cause a crash made a test case so people can try it themselves.

Now for the interesting bit. Loading the test case in safari will trigger a dialog "The operation could not be completed". Now I'm pretty confident this is related to changes with mp4 playback on iOS7 and the fact it needs to meet certain requirements when encoding.

In order to successfully play MP4 files on iOS 7 iPad 4, iPad 3, iPad 2, iPad mini, MP4 files shall meet the following requirements:

• H.264 video up to 720p, 30 frames per second, Main Profile level 3.1 with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps, 48kHz, stereo audio;
• MPEG-4 video, up to 2.5 Mbps, 640 by 480 pixels, 30 frames per second, Simple Profile with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps, 48kHz, stereo audio.

Check this article for more details. I tried following the steps but the application fails on videos less than 1 second. If anyone else would like to try here is the test base64 string in mp4 format.

[ryanseddon]

Ok found an mp4 that iOS7 likes and it doesn't crash see test case.

This test video is huge (245kb) so can someone create or re-encode a small one.

[wibron]

This seems to have been fixed in iOS 7.0.3. Does not crash anymore for me on iPad and iPhone.

[patrickkettner]

Thats great news! So you are good to close this out, then?

[ryanseddon]

Not quite. It doesn't crash but I still get a "The operation could not be completed" dialog message. We still need to re-encode the test base64 string with the newer encoding profile needed so the test will work without showing a dialog message.

[darcyclarke]

I'm still seeing the warning appear. Is a fix for this as simple as @ryanseddon mentions, ie. just re-encoding the base64 strings? Would love for Apple to fix this but a temporary work-around seems quicker.

[patrickkettner]

Its not so much reencoding as it is finding one that won't crash the parser.

[patrickkettner]

@ryanseddon did you actually get that to work in base64? I can't get any base64'd file to work in this situation.

We could hack around this by adding a check for navigator.standalone, but that is ugly as sin

[patrickkettner]

btw, did anyone file a radar ticket for this? There is definitely a bug in safari here

[ryanseddon]

@patrickkettner they fixed the crash in a dot release (7.0.2 maybe). What they won't fix is the fact that we use an old codec profile for our base64 test video. I don't have the ability to re-encode the test video into the right profile that iOS7 will accept I'm 100% certain that this will fix the issue.

[patrickkettner]

Oh! I misunderstood what you meant about reencoding. I'll mess with it more.

[patrickkettner]

@ryanseddon i've been messing with this on and off, and I have never been able to find any video that doesn't cause this the "The operation could not be completed" message from popping up. Nothing crashes the parser anymore, but everything (including the base64 version of the video you mentioned before) I filled an issue with apple (openradar mirror here), but at this point, I am at a loss. I think the only thing we can do here is check for the navigator.standalone.

Also, Seem to have stumbled onto a separate ios bug - this file actually seems to trigger autoplay (ie the video prompt loads automatically, just triggers the above mentioned prompt)

[ryanseddon]

I'm getting the "The operation could not be completed" when loaded in iOS7 safari with my test case when I load it for a second time. The first time on a fresh cache it doesn't show then subsequent times after that it does.

[patrickkettner]

Is anyone able to test if this is still an issue on 7.1?

[patrickkettner]

I tried it - issue still present on 7.1

[patrickkettner]

Its fixed on iOS 8 beta! Huzzah

[wibron]

Wooah, finally! I don't have access to iOS 8 right now, but can someone confirm this is fixed?

[patrickkettner]

checked on a few dev devices, and we look to be good. Is everyone cool if I just add a dev note about iOS 7? Doesn't really look like there is anything to do otherwise :/