Subscriber block does not work when playing the .m3u8 file with ABR enabled.

[Mohit-3196]

Short description

When ABR is enabled and playing the .m3u8 file directly, the subscriber block feature/API is not working.

Environment

• Ant Media Server version: AMS v2.8.2

Steps to reproduce

1. Enable Time-based One-time Password(TOTP) for Playing.
2. Enable adaptive streaming/transcoding.
3. Start a rtmp stream.
4. Generate the subscriber token for the streamId.
5. Play the .m3u8 file ffplay -i "https://ams.antmedia.cloud:5443/LiveApp/streams/abcde_adaptive.m3u8?subscriberId=media&subscriberCode=337308"
6. Call the subscriber block API curl -X 'PUT' 'http://ams-14315.antmedia.cloud:5443/LiveApp/rest/v2/broadcasts/abcde/subscribers/media/block/30/play'

Expected behavior

The playback should stop and the subscriber should be blocked.

Actual behavior

The play continues and the subscriber is not blocked.

It works fine when playing with the embedded player, play.html

Logs

Place logs on pastebin or elsewhere and put links here

Ask your questions on Ant Media Github Discussions

[lastpeony]

I investigated this issue and it appears that when test_adaptive.m3u8 file is requested ffmpeg only passes query parameters on first m3u8 request and afterwards it does not pass subscriberId and subscriberCode to the requests.

Because of this behaviour blocking subscriber on air does not work.

As a workaround solution for ABR case spesific ABR m3u8(teststream_480p1000kbps.m3u8) file can be requested. On this case subscriber block on air will work just like no ABR case.

ffplay -i "http://localhost:5080/WebRTCAppEE/streams/teststream_480p1000kbps.m3u8?subscriberId=lastpeony&subscriberCode=371505"

[Mohit-3196]

Thank you @lastpeony for your investigation and the workaround solution.
In case there are multiple Adaptive settings on the server then this solution is not likely to be affective as the users would like the bitrate to switch as per the internet connection.

[lastpeony]

We have a solution for this problem and its on PR.
If someone needs the fix urgently let me know.