559564 - Gzipped content (MP3s) & Quicktime Plugin

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[Lawrence Coffin]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2.3) Gecko/20100401 Firefox/3.6.3 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2.3) Gecko/20100401 Firefox/3.6.3 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)

The Quicktime Plugin only plays the first few seconds of MP3 files that are sent using gzip compression (Apache's mod_gzip). This doesn't happen with every file, but did with four of the five MP3s I tested. If MP3s are excluded from gzip compression, then they play fine.

I'm not sure if this is a Quicktime Plugin problem or a Firefox problem, but since Firefox is handling the file transfer (I believe), I assume it is a Firefox problem. Plus these files play fine with the Quicktime Plugin in IE.

See the included link where I've posted a detailed description of what happens on Apple's support forums.

A quick summary is that with content that is playing correctly, the Firebug Net panel shows the content is downloaded completely before the Quicktime Plugin controls are displayed and the content is played. With content that does not play correctly, the Quicktime Plugin controls are displayed after only a short bit of the file is downloaded; the plugin plays and stops, and the Net panel shows that the file is still in the process of being downloaded.

Again, turning off gzip compression on the server for MP3 files gets around the problem, but this still seems like a bug that should get fixed (the content encoding used during transfer shouldn't affect what happens once the file content has reached the client).

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
(Happens every time for the same MP3 file, although some MP3s are not affected.)

1. Upload MP3
2. Turn on gzip compression (mod_gzip)
3. Install Quicktime Plugin
4. Access MP3 file directly

Actual Results:  
First few seconds play, then player stops (progress bar is all the way to the right indicating that the player thinks that was the entire file)

Expected Results:  
Should play fully

Firefox 3.6.3
Quicktime Plugin 7.6.6
Windows XP

Comment 1

[Lawrence Coffin]

This bug may be related:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=275516

Comment 2

[Jim Sontag]

@Lawrence - I have had a similar bug with FF 3.6 - it is still in FF 3.6.15 and now the new 4.0.  Have a look a
t 
bug 643327 

or at the following page(s)...

http://sontag.ca/soundboards/Losers2.html

I know this is ancient history now, but any feedback would be appreciated.

Regards
Jim

Comment 3

[Filipus Klutiero]

This sounds related to #435480.

Comment 4

[Frankie]

RIP QuickTime for Windows