Delayed start of music stream using V. 65.0.2
When I launch the Radio Forge music player (a Wordpress plugin based on the Muse player) from my website (https://RadioFreeAmericana.com) using Firefox V. 65.0.2, there is about a 20 to 30 second delay until the music starts playing. (Listeners have also confirmed this phenomenon.) I am running Wordpress 5.1.
The problem is isolated to the new Firefox browser, as there is no problem with the audio stream and the Radio Forge music player works fine with other browsers (including the previous Firefox V. 64.0.2) -- as it has for over a year.
What could be causing this delay? Is it some sort of Firefox validation process? How can the delay be eliminated? Is there a Firefox configuration setting that can address this issue?
To be clear, Firebox is not blocking the player, nor does Firefox issue a warning message. It's just a delayed start of the player, as if Firebox is validating something before "agreeing" to stream the audio. You can see for yourself by clicking Listen at https://RadioFreeAmericana.com.
Thanks for any insights.
All Replies (10)
Hello DJCat,
Radio Free Americana says :
"FIREFOX USERS: If Web Player is launched using Firefox V. 65.0.2 (released Feb 28, 2019), it may take a minute for music to start playing. Patience is appreciated. We are working on solutions. "
Does that message come from you ?
Okulungisiwe ngu McCoy
Mine doesn't auto-play at all in Firefox or Edge, I have to click the play triangle, and then the stream starts within a couple seconds.
Is it supposed to auto-play at some point? It does seem to take forever for the stuff below the player to fill in.
Ignore the playlist info below the player -- that's not the issue. I'm talking about the audio. And, it is NOT set to auto-play, so, no, it will not auto-play. (I choose not to configure it as auto-play, because many users find that annoying.)
Instead, you need to manually click the play button after launching the popup player. Normally, it takes 1 second for the audio to start after clicking play. Since the latest version of Firefox was released, it takes about 20 to 30 seconds for audio to start -- again, the problem only arises with the latest version 65.0.2. It acts as if it is trying to validate something.
Thanks.
The message to Firefox users comes from me. I operate the radio station.
DJCat said
Ignore the playlist info below the player -- that's not the issue.
Hmm, are you sure? If I popup the player window and click the triangle as soon as it's available, then scroll to the bottom of the popup window. The stream starts playing 1-4 seconds after the last "Recently Played" listing appears.
Interestingly, if I use Reload (Ctrl+r) in the popup instead of closing and re-launching it, then the stream starts independently of the Recently Played items.
Here's another thing to try: after the player appears in the popup window and the little message slides it down, click the X button on the toolbar to stop the rest of the page from loading. Then click the play button and the stream should start after about a second.
Hi jscher2000,
Yes, I agree there is a connection with the playlist, as you surmised. I created a test page with only the player (no playlist), and it begins playing immediately upon clicking the play button. The test page is at https://radiofreeamericana.com/test-player/.
That being said, there is still something different about the way the new release of Firefox is working. With the prior Firefox release (and with Google Chrome and other browsers, if you'd like to experiment), the player begins playing BEFORE the playlist is loaded. In other words, the playlist has NO impact on the stream whatsoever. (Because of the nature of the beast, it will take a while for ALL of the last 10 songs to display, as it requires querying remote servers.) With the new Firefox release, it appears that it wants to do things in reverse order -- that is, to display everything on the page before the audio stream starts. That is definitely a change in the way it operates and, to the best of my knowledge, unique to this new version of Firefox.
Anyway, I appreciate your help in identifying what is happening. I still need to solve the problem, however, which I presume is to figure how to get Firefox to begin the audio stream before loading anything else -- the way it used to work.
Thanks.
knock on wood, I think I may have found a solution -- possibly 2 solutions. One is to set the player to Auto-Start. The second is to change the player's default 1-second buffer (which provides a "pleasing" start) to zero. Looks like either one of these may work -- enabling the audio stream to start independent of (and before) the rest of the page loads.
I'd like to keep this open until further testing and live implementation.
Thanks for insights.
Hi DJCat, it might be a change that is specific to media files. I haven't been following all of the changes, and in the main articles for developers, nothing jumps out at me as relevant. If you have enormous patience and a fast connection, you could try to triangulate the specific change using the Mozregression tool. However, if you can implement lazy/deferred loading of the widgets that seem to affect Firefox, that might be easier.
- I can't tell whether anything here is relevant:
- Mozregression: https://mozilla.github.io/mozregression/
False positive. The above solution does not work. I was tricked into believing it would work because I was testing the re-configured player settings in a full-sized window. I should have been testing in the popup window.
It turns out that as long as the player is launched in a popup window, the new version of Firefox wants to load the entire page/window contents (i.e., the last 10 songs played) BEFORE starting the audio stream. Again, this is a change in the way Firefox has operated and is unique to the latest version.
Ok, I've got it solved. To summarize, I launch the Sound Forge radio player in a popup window. I like to include a playlist of the last 10 songs played within this popup window. However, with the new version of Firefox (65.0.2), the Sound Forge player will not start audio until all page content has been loaded -- creating a delayed start of about 20+ seconds (the time it takes to refresh the last 10 songs played). To be clear, this problem ONLY happens when the player page is opened in a popup window using Firefox 65.0.2. As a work-around solution, I've set up the player launch to open in a popup window WITHOUT the 10-song playlist. In this way, the audio starts immediately. However, I provide the option to show the 10-song playlist by clicking a link. When clicked, it closes the original popup without the playlist, and opens a different popup that includes the playlist (giving the appearance that it is just expanding the popup window). In this way, the audio continues while the playlist loads. If you are interested, that's how I got around the problem and you can see it in operation at https://RadioFreeAmericana.com by clicking any of the listen links.
Although this solution is fine, I think this issue could potentially impact other website owners who launch media players via a popup window that contains other content. Launching a media player in a popup window is common practice, as it allows media playback while visiting/surfing other web sites/pages.