Hi,It seems like it's pretty easy to consume HTTP Live Streaming content in an iOS app. Unfortunately, I need to consume media from an RTSP server. It seems to me that this is a very similar thing, and that all of the underpinnings for doing it ought to be present in iOS, but I'm having a devil of a time figuring out how to make it work without doing a lot of programming.For starters, I know that there are web-based services that can consume an RTSP stream and rebroadcast it as an HTTP Live Stream that can be easily consumed by the media players in iOS. This won't work for me because my application needs to function in an environment where there is no internet access (it's on a private Wifi network where the only other thing on the network is the device that is serving the RTSP stream).Having read everything I can get my hands on and exploring third-party and open-source solutions, I've compiled the following list of ideas:1. Using an iOS build of the open-source ffmpeg library, which supports RTSP, I've come up with a test app that can receive the RTSP packets, decode them, create UIImages out of the frames, and display those frames on-screen. This provides a crude player, but performance is poor, most likely because ffmpeg can't take advantage of any hardware acceleration. It also doesn't provide me with any way to integrate the video stream into AVFoundation, so I'm on my own as far as saving the stream to a file, transcoding it, etc.2. I know that the AVURLAsset class doesn't directly support the RTSP scheme. Since I have access to the undecoded RTSP packets via ffmpeg, I've thought it should be possible to implement RTSP support myself via a custom NSURLProtocol, essentially fooling AVFoundation into reading those packets as if they originated in a file. I'm not sure if this would work, since the raw packets coming from the RTSP server might lack the headers that would otherwise be present in data being read from a file. I'm not even sure if AVFoundation would recognize my custom protocol.3. If a protocol doesn't work, I've considered that I might be able to implement my own local HTTP Live Streaming server that converts the RTSP packets into an HTTP stream that the media players can read. This sounds like a terribly convoluted solution to the problem, at best, and very difficult at worst.4. Going back to solution (1), if I could speed up the decoding by using some iOS CoreVideo function instead of ffmpeg, this solution might be okay. However, I can't find any documentation for CoreVideo on iOS (Apple only documents it for OS X).5. I'm certainly willing to license a third-party solution if it works well and provides good performance. Unfortunately, everything I've found so far is pretty crummy and mostly just leverages ffmpeg and/or VLC. What is most disappointing to me is that nobody seems to be able or willing to provide a solution that neatly integrates with AVFoundation. I really want to make my RTSP stream available as an AVAsset so I can use it with AVFoundation players and other classes -- I don't want to build an app that relies on custom third-party code for everything.Any ideas, tips, advice would be greatly appreciated.Thanks,Frank
Streaming
RSS for tagDeep dive into the technical specifications that influence seamless playback for streaming services, including bitrates, codecs, and caching mechanisms.
Selecting any option will automatically load the page
Post
Replies
Boosts
Views
Created
The same H265 encrypted Fairplay content can be played in all Apple devices except A1625.
The clear H265 content is played in A1625.
The question is: will this model (A1625) support H265 Fairplay encrypted content?
A ticket was created here:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/255658006?sortBy=best
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Streaming
Tags:
FairPlay Streaming
Media
Video
HTTP Live Streaming
I have an HDR10+ encoded video that if loaded as a mov plays back on the Apple Vision Pro but when that video is encoded using the latest (1.23b) Apple HLS tools to generate an fMP4 - the resulting m3u8 cannot be played back in the Apple Vision Pro and I only get back a "Cannot Open" error.
To generate the m3u8, I'm just calling mediafilesegmenter (with -iso-fragmented) and then variantplaylistcreator. This completes with no errors but the m3u8 will playback on the Mac using VLC but not on the Apple Vision Pro.
The relevant part of the m3u8 is:
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=40022507,BANDWIDTH=48883974,VIDEO-RANGE=PQ,CODECS="ec-3,hvc1.1.60000000.L180.B0",RESOLUTION=4096x4096,FRAME-RATE=24.000,CLOSED-CAPTIONS=NONE,AUDIO="audio1",REQ-VIDEO-LAYOUT="CH-STEREO"
{{url}}
Has anyone been able to use the HLS tools to generate fMP4s of MV-HEVC videos with HDR10?
I use AVPlayer to play HLS video successfully on macOS Sonoma, but I encountered this error on macOS Sequoia. Please help me:
Error Domain=AVFoundationErrorDomain Code=-11833 ‘Cannot Decode’ UserInfo={NSUnderlyingError=0x600001e57330 {Error Domain=CoreMediaErrorDomain Code=-12906 ‘(null)’}, NSLocalizedFailureReason=The decoder required for this media cannot be found., AVErrorMediaTypeKey=vide, NSLocalizedDescription=Cannot Decode}
Thanks!
In an m3u8 manifest, audio EXT-X-MEDIA tags usually contain CHANNELS tag containing the audio channels count like so:
#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,URI="audio_clear_eng_stereo.m3u8",GROUP-ID="default-audio-group",LANGUAGE="en",NAME="stream_5",AUTOSELECT=YES,CHANNELS="2"
Is it possible to get this info from AVPlayer, AVMediaSelectionOption or some related API?
I'm developing a tutorial style tvOS app with multiple videos. The examples I've seen so far deal with only one video.
Defining the player and source(url) before body view
let avPlayer = AVPlayer(url: URL(string: "https://domain.com/.../.../video.mp4")!))
and then in the body view the video is displayed
VideoPlayer(player: avPlayer)
This allows options such as stop/start etc.
When I try something similar with a video title passed into this view I can't define the player with this title variable.
var vTitle: String
var avPlayer = AVPlayer(url: URL(string: "https://domain.com/.../.../" + vTitle + ".mp4"")!))
var body: some View {
I het an error that vTitle can't be used in the url above the body view.
Any thoughts or suggestions? Thanks
I'm developing an iOS radio app that plays various HLS streams. The challenge is that some stations broadcast HLS streams containing both audio and video (example: https://svs.itworkscdn.net/smcwatarlive/smcwatar/chunks.m3u8), but I want to:
Extract and play only the audio track
Support AirPlay for audio-only streaming
Minimize data usage by not downloading video content
Technical Details:
iOS 17+
Swift 5.9
Using AVFoundation for playback
Current implementation uses AVPlayer with AVPlayerItem
Current Code Structure:
class StreamPlayer: ObservableObject {
@Published var isPlaying = false
private var player: AVPlayer?
private var playerItem: AVPlayerItem?
func playStream(url: URL) {
let asset = AVURLAsset(url: url)
playerItem = AVPlayerItem(asset: asset)
player = AVPlayer(playerItem: playerItem)
player?.play()
}
Stream Analysis:
When analyzing the video stream using FFmpeg:
CopyInput #0, hls, from 'https://svs.itworkscdn.net/smcwatarlive/smcwatar/chunks.m3u8':
Stream #0:0: Video: h264, yuv420p(tv, bt709), 1920x1080 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 25 fps
Stream #0:1: Audio: aac, 44100 Hz, stereo, fltp
Attempted Solutions:
Using MobileFFmpeg:
let command = [
"-i", streamUrl,
"-vn",
"-acodec", "aac",
"-ac", "2",
"-ar", "44100",
"-b:a", "128k",
"-f", "mpegts",
"udp://127.0.0.1:12345"
].joined(separator: " ")
ffmpegProcess = MobileFFmpeg.execute(command)
Issue: While FFmpeg successfully extracts audio, playback through AVPlayer doesn't work reliably.
Tried using HLS output:
let command = [
"-i", streamUrl,
"-vn",
"-acodec", "aac",
"-ac", "2",
"-ar", "44100",
"-b:a", "128k",
"-f", "hls",
"-hls_time", "2",
"-hls_list_size", "3",
outputUrl.path
]
Issue: Creates temporary files but faces synchronization issues with live streams.
Requirements:
Real-time audio extraction from HLS stream
Maintain live streaming capabilities
Full AirPlay support
Minimal data usage (avoid downloading video content)
Handle network interruptions gracefully
Questions:
What's the most efficient way to extract only audio from an HLS stream in real-time?
Is there a way to tell AVPlayer to ignore video tracks completely?
Are there better alternatives to FFmpeg for this specific use case?
What's the recommended approach for handling AirPlay with modified streams?
Any guidance or alternative approaches would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Streaming
Here we are focusing to change the cookie at every 120 seconds while playing , in apple avplayer we can't modify cookie after initialisation due to that we followed the approach to using " Resource loader delegate " to pass cookie as a header value .
What I notice is that the playlist file (.m3u8) gets downloaded correctly. Then video file (.m4a) some chunks also gets downloaded. I know that the .ts file is downloaded because I can see the GET request completing on the web server with status 200. I also set a breakpoint at the following line:
loadingRequest.dataRequest?.respond(with: data)
immediately got error from avplayer status as
"The operation could not be completed. An unknown error occurred (-12881) From core media"
Need confirmation on why I am unable to load HLS using resource loader.
is it possible to update cookie value while paying continuously on avplayer.
override func viewDidLoad() {
super.viewDidLoad()
// Do any additional setup after loading the view.
let urlString = "localhost://demo.unified-streaming.com/k8s/features/stable/video/tears-of-steel/tears-of-steel.ism/.m3u8"
guard let url = URL(string: urlString) else {
print("Invalid URL")
return
}
//Create cookie to prepare for player asset
let cookie = HTTPCookie(properties: [
.name: "dazn-token",
.value: "cookie value",
.domain: url.host() ?? "",
.path: "/",
.discard: true
])
//Create cookie key to set AVURLAsset
let options = [AVURLAssetHTTPCookiesKey: [cookie]]
let asset = AVURLAsset(url: url,options: options)
proxy = ReverseProxyResourceLoader()
proxy?.cookie = "exampleCookie"
// Set resource loader delegate to moniter the chunks
asset.resourceLoader.setDelegate(proxy, queue: DispatchQueue.global())
// Load asset keys asynchronously (e.g., "playable")
let keys = ["playable"]
// Initialize the AVPlayer with the URL
let playerItem = AVPlayerItem(asset: asset)
self.player = AVPlayer(playerItem: playerItem)
playerItem.addObserver(self, forKeyPath: "status", options: [.new, .initial], context: nil)
// Observe 'error' property (if needed)
playerItem.addObserver(self, forKeyPath: "error", options: [.new], context: nil)
let contentKeySessionDelegate = ContentKeyDelegate()
// Initialize AVContentKeySession
let contentKeySession = AVContentKeySession(keySystem: .clearKey)
self.contentKeySession = contentKeySession
contentKeySession.setDelegate(contentKeySessionDelegate, queue: DispatchQueue.main)
// Associate the asset with the content key session
contentKeySession.addContentKeyRecipient(asset)
// Create a layer for the AVPlayer and add it to the view
playerLayer = AVPlayerLayer(player: player)
playerLayer?.frame = view.bounds
playerLayer?.videoGravity = .resizeAspect
if let playerLayer = playerLayer {
view.layer.addSublayer(playerLayer)
}
NotificationCenter.default.addObserver(
self,
selector: #selector(playerDidFinishPlaying),
name: .AVPlayerItemDidPlayToEndTime,
object: player?.currentItem
)
// Start playback
player?.play()
}
// Update cookie when ever needed
func updateCookie() {
proxy?.cookie = "update exampleCookie"
}
@objc private func playerDidFinishPlaying(notification: Notification) {
print("Playback finished!")
// Optionally, handle end-of-playback actions here
}
//
// ReverseProxyResourceLoader.swift
// HLSDemo
//
// Created by Gajje.Venkatarao on 12/12/24.
//
import Foundation
import AVKit
import AVFoundation
class ReverseProxyResourceLoader: NSObject, AVAssetResourceLoaderDelegate {
var cookie = ""
func resourceLoader(_ resourceLoader: AVAssetResourceLoader, shouldWaitForLoadingOfRequestedResource loadingRequest: AVAssetResourceLoadingRequest) -> Bool {
resourceLoader.preloadsEligibleContentKeys = true
guard let interceptedURL = loadingRequest.request.url else {
loadingRequest.finishLoading(with: NSError(domain: "ReverseProxy", code: -1, userInfo: [NSLocalizedDescriptionKey: "Invalid URL"]))
return false
}
if interceptedURL.scheme == "skd" {
print("Token updated Cookie:", interceptedURL )
return false
}
var components = URLComponents(url: interceptedURL, resolvingAgainstBaseURL: false)
components?.scheme = "https" // Replace with the original scheme
guard let originalURL = components?.url else {
loadingRequest.finishLoading(with: NSError(domain: "ReverseProxy", code: -1, userInfo: [NSLocalizedDescriptionKey: "Failed to map URL"]))
loadingRequest.finishLoading()
return false
}
var request = URLRequest(url: originalURL)
request.httpMethod = "GET"
if let storeCoockie = HTTPCookie(properties: [
.name: "dazn-token",
.value: cookie,
.domain: originalURL.host ?? "",
.path: "/",
.discard: true
]){
HTTPCookieStorage.shared.setCookie(storeCoockie)
}
let headers = loadingRequest.request.allHTTPHeaderFields ?? [:]
for (key, value) in headers {
request.addValue(value, forHTTPHeaderField: key)
}
request.addValue(cookie, forHTTPHeaderField: "Cookie")
URLSession.shared.configuration.httpShouldSetCookies = true
request.httpShouldHandleCookies = true
let task = (URLSession.shared.dataTask(with: originalURL) { data, response, error in
if let error = error {
print("Error Received:", error)
loadingRequest.finishLoading(with: error)
return
}
print(originalURL)
guard let data = data , let url = response?.url else {
loadingRequest.finishLoading(with: NSError(domain: "ReverseProxy", code: -1, userInfo: [NSLocalizedDescriptionKey: "No data received"]))
return
}
loadingRequest.dataRequest?.respond(with: data)
loadingRequest.finishLoading()
} as URLSessionDataTask)
task.resume()
return true
}
}
Example project
Can some one please answer me How Can I update the cookies of the previously set m3u8 video in AVPlayer without creating the new AVURLAsset and replacing the AVPlayer current Item with it
Hi,
I have been working on a project that enables users to listen to their favorite music using a streaming service, which so far was Spotify. The app had a programmable 3D/2D interface with the ability to connect to devices in your home and have them react to music. As of September 2024, Spotify decomissioned their Audio Analysis API. I have seen other posts mention playing Apple Music through AVFoundation, which would break DRM and so it’s not supported. However, the Spotify Audio Analysis API does not allow for a full frequency reconstruction. It is entirely temporal data on beats, kicks, loudness, and timbre changes, which themselves are operators on the spectral data from the FFT. It would be very useful for the developer community if we get the ability to do this and it will probably Apple Music among developers and those who use their apps a lot more.
Would love to hear your thoughts about this and Happy New Year!
ApplicationMusicPlayer with queue created from playlist crashes with random occurrence shortly after skipping back or forth using controls embedded in the notification, with the error on console log: applicationController: xpc service connection interrupted.
I've noticed that the issue occurs more frequently the shorter is time between skipping entries. Since ApplicationMusicPlayer is run on a remote process, the main app does not crash, but the music stops playing without any exception, and the playback control turns uninitiated.
Here is how I'm initiating the queue:
let entries = playlist
.with(.entries).entries!
.map { ApplicationMusicPlayer.Queue.Entry($0) }
ApplicationMusicPlayer.shared.queue = .init(
entries, startingAt: entries.last
)
Please give me some tips on how to solve this.
EDIT:
The issue does not occur when navigating quickly through the station.
I am reaching out regarding an issue with my Apple FairPlay Streaming Certificate. To generate the certificate signing request (CSR), I used the following OpenSSL commands:
openssl genrsa -out private_key.pem 1024 openssl req -new -key private_key.pem -out request.csr
However, according to the guide provided by Apple and instructions from my DRM provider, I should have used:
openssl genrsa -aes256 -out privatekey.pem 1024 openssl req -new -sha1 -key privatekey.pem -out certreq.csr -subj "/CN=SubjectName /OU=OrganizationalUnit /O=Organization /C=US"
I suspect this discrepancy might be causing the issue with my FairPlay certificate. After obtaining the fairplay.cer file and importing it into Keychain Access, I noticed the following:
When I expand the certificate in Keychain Access, I can only see a public key and no private key.
As a result, I am unable to export the certificate as a .p12 file, as this option is disabled.
As per my DRM provider's instructions, I need to export the certificate along with the corresponding private key as a .p12 file with a password. Since the private key is not visible in Keychain Access, I am unable to proceed further.
I have read the FairPlay Streaming Overview but could not find any reasons as to why this issue is occurring or guidance on the procedure to revoke a certificate.
Additionally, I came across the terms and conditions which mentioned reaching out to product-security at Apple for assistance in revoking corrupt certificates. However, despite reaching out, I have not received a response.
Any help on how to proceed will be great!
In our Apple TV application, we are using the native AVPlayer for live playback functionality. During live restart playback, we intermittently encounter an error when the playback timeline approaches the actual live event end time.
Error:
The operation couldn’t be completed. (CoreMediaErrorDomain error -16839 - Unable to get playlist before long download timer) / Failure reason:
Scenario:
The live event is scheduled from 7:00 AM to 8:00 AM.
Restart playback begins at 7:20 AM, allowing the user to watch the event from the start while the live stream continues in real-time.
As the restart playback timeline approaches the actual event end time (8:00 AM), AVPlayer displays an error, and playback continues in the background.
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Streaming
Tags:
FairPlay Streaming
Media Player
HTTP Live Streaming
It seems currently 5G Network Slicing is only available on URL Request / URL Session / Low level network and not on AVPlayer, is it possible to have the app using default slice when start the app and only enable Network Slicing when streaming video via AVPlayer?
We are having issues with ScreenCaptureKit. Our use case is the following:
We have multiple applications that each starts a stream capture, using ScreenCaptureKit. It works fine when just one application is streaming, but when starting multiple streams continuesly, all streams stops or crashes, without ScreenCaptureKit reporting an error back.
Restarting replayd for the user will allow us to start streaming again, if the streaming applications are restartet too.
We have build a small test program that we have tested on different Macs, running different versions of macOS, with identical results. The test program just calls the 'getShareableContentExcludingDesktopWindows' function multiple times, since this was the simplest way to show the problem.
Our test setup is the following:
Mac Mini M2 macOS 13.6
MacBook Pro M3 macOS 14.4
MacBook Pro M3 macOS 15.1
Code main.m
#import <Foundation/Foundation.h>
#import <ScreenCaptureKit/ScreenCaptureKit.h>
@interface Runner : NSObject
@property(atomic, assign) BOOL keepRunning;
@property(atomic, retain) SCShareableContent* availableWindows;
-(void) updateAvailableWindows;
-(void) notif:(NSNotification*) aNotif;
@end
int main(int argc, const char * argv[]) {
@autoreleasepool {
NSRunLoop* loo = [NSRunLoop mainRunLoop];
Runner* r = [[Runner alloc] init];
[r updateAvailableWindows];
while (r.keepRunning)
[loo runUntilDate:[NSDate distantFuture]];
NSLog(@"Program exit");
}
return 0;
}
@implementation Runner
-(instancetype) init
{
self = [super init];
if(self){
_keepRunning = YES;
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self selector:@selector(notif:) name:@"windowWasNotFound" object:nil];
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self selector:@selector(notif:) name:@"windowWasFound" object:nil];
}
return self;
}
-(void) updateAvailableWindows
{
@autoreleasepool {
NSLog(@"begin");
[SCShareableContent getShareableContentExcludingDesktopWindows:NO onScreenWindowsOnly:YES completionHandler:^(SCShareableContent* content, NSError* error){
NSLog(@"running");
if(!error){
self.availableWindows = content;
for (__unused SCWindow* aWin in self.availableWindows.windows) {
[NSThread sleepForTimeInterval:0.01];
}
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] postNotificationName:@"windowWasFound" object:self.availableWindows];
}
else{
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] postNotificationName:@"windowWasNotFound" object:nil];
}
}];
}
}
-(void) notif:(NSNotification*) aNotif
{
if(aNotif.object)
[self performSelectorOnMainThread:@selector(updateAvailableWindows) withObject:nil waitUntilDone:NO];
else{
NSLog(@"Not Found");
self.keepRunning = NO;
}
}
@end
How to replicate:
Compile and run the program from multiple terminal windows (terminal must be granted screen recording permission) and notice that the output stops, when the replayd stops responding (our assumption). Restarting the application does nothing, before the replayd also is restarted.
Running th application in Xcode gives the following error:
[ERROR] -[RPDaemonProxy fetchShareableContentWithOption:windowID:currentProcess:withCompletionHandler:]_block_invoke:902 error: 4097
This error is not something we have been able to detect in our applications - and since the only workaround is restarting replayd and the applications, catching the error would help us.
Hello!
Just curious if AVAssetWriter append() randomly fails for anyone but me? Seems to happen when live streaming (encoding with VTCompressionSession) and recording (with AVAssetWriter) at the same time.
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Streaming
We move to another streaming service and need to deliver a ASK, .PEM &key, and CRT to enable DRM. Now the issue is that we don't have that information anymore.
Most logical would be to revoke the current certificate and create a new one. Unfortunately for Fairplay Streaming Certificates there is no revoke button.
We asked developer support who isn't able to help. We then did a request to revoke as described in article 2.7 of the Apple Developer Program License Agreement. They can only do this when the certificate is compromised.
So now we are stuck. Anyone out there who had the same issue and found a solution?
Your help is much appreciated.
In our Apple TV application, we use the native AVPlayer for live playback functionality. Until tvOS 17.6 and during the tvOS 18 beta, the Pause/Resume feature worked as expected, allowing us to pause live playback. However, after updating to tvOS 18.1, the pause functionality no longer works.
The same app still works fine on tvOS 17, but on tvOS 18, attempting to pause live playback has no effect. We reviewed the tvOS 18 release notes but couldn't find any relevant changes or deprecations related to AVPlayer or live playback behavior.
Has there been any change in the handling of live playback or the Pause/Resume functionality in tvOS 18.1? Any guidance or suggestions to address this issue would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you!
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Streaming
Tags:
FairPlay Streaming
Media Player
HTTP Live Streaming
Hello, we have HLS Stream app on Apple TV. Our streams are DRM protected. We have problem with streams when source device is turned off. For example, user start to watch our HLS DRM Protected content. After some time, user turns off device (it can be Monitor or TV via connected HDMI). Our app does not understand HDMI Source device turned off. Is there any way to understand HDMI connected device is turned off on Swift?
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Streaming
Tags:
FairPlay Streaming
Swift
Apple TV
HTTP Live Streaming
Hi folks,
When doing HLS v6 live streaming with fmp4 chunks we noticed that when the encoder timestamps slightly drift and a #EXT-X-DISCONTINUITY tag is created in either the audio or video playlist (in an ABR setup), the tag is not correctly handled by the player leading to a broken playback containing black screen or no audio (depending on which playlist the tag is printed in).
We noticed that this is often true when the number of tags is odd between the playlists (eg. the audio playlist contains 1 tag and the video contains 2 tags will result in a black screen with audio).
By using the same "broken" source but using Shaka player instead won't break the playback at all.
Are there any possible fix (or upcoming) for AV Player?