Bug: AudioSegment.from_mp3(mp3_audio) in Mac (Solved)

[jxlil]

Hello

I was receiving the following error when trying to solve captcha by audio in Macos (I leave the solution in case someone else gets the same error):

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/Users/jxlil/captcha/test.py", line 10, in <module>
    token = solver.solve_recaptcha(wait=True)
            ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/Users/jxlil/captcha/.venv/lib/python3.11/site-packages/playwright_recaptcha/recaptchav2/sync_solver.py", line 606, in solve_recaptcha
    self._solve_audio_challenge(recaptcha_box)
  File "/Users/jxlil/captcha/.venv/lib/python3.11/site-packages/playwright_recaptcha/recaptchav2/sync_solver.py", line 464, in _solve_audio_challenge
    text = self._convert_audio_to_text(url)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/Users/jxlil/captcha/.venv/lib/python3.11/site-packages/playwright_recaptcha/recaptchav2/sync_solver.py", line 274, in _convert_audio_to_text
    audio = AudioSegment.from_mp3(mp3_audio)
            ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/Users/jxlil/captcha/.venv/lib/python3.11/site-packages/pydub/audio_segment.py", line 796, in from_mp3
    return cls.from_file(file, 'mp3', parameters=parameters)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/Users/jxlil/captcha/.venv/lib/python3.11/site-packages/pydub/audio_segment.py", line 728, in from_file
    info = mediainfo_json(orig_file, read_ahead_limit=read_ahead_limit)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/Users/jxlil/captcha/.venv/lib/python3.11/site-packages/pydub/utils.py", line 279, in mediainfo_json
    info = json.loads(output)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python@3.11/3.11.6_1/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.11/lib/python3.11/json/__init__.py", line 346, in loads
    return _default_decoder.decode(s)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python@3.11/3.11.6_1/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.11/lib/python3.11/json/decoder.py", line 337, in decode
    obj, end = self.raw_decode(s, idx=_w(s, 0).end())
               ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python@3.11/3.11.6_1/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.11/lib/python3.11/json/decoder.py", line 355, in raw_decode
    raise JSONDecodeError("Expecting value", s, err.value) from None
json.decoder.JSONDecodeError: Expecting value: line 1 column 1 (char 0)
Future exception was never retrieved
future: <Future finished exception=Error('Connection closed')>
playwright._impl._api_types.Error: Connection closed

The error is generated in the pydub (pydub/utils.py) library, in this part:

def mediainfo_json(filepath, read_ahead_limit=-1):
    ...
    command = [prober, '-of', 'json'] + command_args
    res = Popen(command, stdin=stdin_parameter, stdout=PIPE, stderr=PIPE)
    output, stderr = res.communicate(input=stdin_data)
    output = output.decode("utf-8", 'ignore')
    stderr = stderr.decode("utf-8", 'ignore')

    --> info = json.loads(output)

This is because output is an empty string and it is supposed to be a JSON formatted string.

---

Solution

Although the problem seems to be in one of the libraries, in my case it was due to ffmpeg. Reinstalling it as follows solved the problem:

brew uninstall librist --ignore-dependencies
brew uninstall mbedtls --ignore-dependencies
brew reinstall ffmpeg