1164877 - Brightcove videos play only sound in Firefox on Android

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Web Compatibility :: Site Reports, defect)

Description

[Hallvord R. M. Steen [:hallvors]]

The older version of Brightcove's SmartPlayer uses some browser detection to figure out things about the environment that can not easily be feature detected.

One such feature is whether videos will open in a different player, or play inline in the page itself.

One of the factors it looks at is the Android version. Now, if the visitor is using Firefox this version number is irrelevant, and it is not exposed in the UA string.

Unfortunately, this means the video will play sound only, no visuals. 

If the isAndroidWithInPagePlayback() method could also consider the Firefox version, it would work fine. This change is tested extensively with many of the sites we know have video problems.

Here's the suggested code for this method - the change should only affect Firefox on Androids and smartphones:

brightcove.player.utils.PlayerUtil.isAndroidWithInPagePlayback = function(pUserAgent) {
    var
        userAgent = pUserAgent || brightcove.userAgent,
        isAmazonSilk = /Silk/g.test(userAgent),
        androidVersion = (userAgent.match(/\bAndroid (\d+\.\d+)/) || [])[1],
        firefoxVersion = (userAgent.match(/\b(Mobile|Android).*Firefox\/(\d+\.\d+)/) || [])[2];
    return (+androidVersion >= 3.1 || +firefoxVersion >= 34) && !(isAmazonSilk && !brightcove.player.utils.PlayerUtil.isAmazonSilkWithInPagePlayback(userAgent));
};

One of the places this is testable is here:
http://support.brightcove.com/en/video-cloud/docs/video-test-html-5

It would be great if this could be fixed at source, since many customers load their scripts directly from brightcove.com servers. If not, we have to start contacting Brightcove's customers about the problem and recommend fixes to them - to improve the experience of our (and their) users.

Comment 1

[Mike Taylor [:miketaylr]]

Let's ask them to fix this, but then seriously consider a UA override for hosted "old" players for b2g and Fennec. It would be a big win to get all Brightcove video working for our users.

Comment 2

[Mike Taylor [:miketaylr]]

*for Brightcove hosted players, that is.

Comment 3

[Hallvord R. M. Steen [:hallvors]]

This bug is no longer relevant when we add an Android version number by default.