Bug: Now Playing Screen must be displayed for audio to continue

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Now Playing screen cannot play next track if scene is navigated away
from.(Audio Service fails).  Other applications seemed to have overcome
this, so there has to be a solution.

Current workaround is to simply stop the track when user leaves the now
playing screen.  Desired operation would be to keep the playlist/music
going and give the user the option re-enter the now playing screen.

Proposed solution would be to set the Now Playing variable in the
AudioPlayer object to null.  All call outs to the Now Playing screen have
null checks already.

Other, probably better option would be run the Now Playing as a separate
stage.  

See:
http://developer.palm.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1598
http://developer.palm.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1648#Intr
oductiontowebOSApplications-controllersassistants

Original issue reported on code.google.com by bjgeiser@gmail.com on 2 Sep 2009 at 3:13

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Original comment by bjgeiser@gmail.com on 2 Sep 2009 at 3:21

• Added labels: Priority-High
• Removed labels: Priority-Medium

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This is only an issue in WebOS.  Safari not have this issue.  Which is going to
make it super fun to debug.

Original comment by bjgeiser@gmail.com on 22 Sep 2009 at 2:02

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Changing app name to com.palm could have fixed this.

Original comment by bjgeiser@gmail.com on 22 Sep 2009 at 2:03

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Is there a reason that you are you using AudioTag.extendElement instead of
new.Audio()? If I use new.Audio(), I can get the music to continue playing if I
navigate away from the Now Playing scene. 

The below page warns that "[the new.Audio()] API does not give you much control 
of
where in the DOM the document is added and may cause problems with applications
containing multiple scenes." but it seems to me that if you extend a div in the 
Now
Playing screen, that div is going to be destroyed when the scene is popped and 
you're
going to lose your Audio() element no matter what. I guess another solution 
would be
to extend a div that will always be available, like something in index.html. 
From
some commented code in the app assistant, it seems you may have already tried 
that.

Pardon me if I'm way off base, I'm pretty fresh to a lot of this stuff and still
finding my way around.

http://developer.palm.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1539

Original comment by mbet...@gmail.com on 26 Sep 2009 at 6:19

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I originally had is as a new.Audio() and I ran into some problems with starting
another song when I left the current scene, the song which was currently playing
would play to the end, but when i attempted to buffer the next one it would die.

Palms music player works in the way you are describing.  Which makes me thing 
that
changing the app name could have been a fix for this.  It changed a lot of other
stuff so it could have fixed this as well.

I also tried putting it in index.html in my original attempts.

Original comment by bjgeiser@gmail.com on 26 Sep 2009 at 12:23

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Some of the navigation and changes in scenes/stages are outside of the HTML5 
spec,
which the link above mentions at the top.

Also, I'm guessing palm namespace is required to access the necessary event 
information.

Granted, I'm just learning this stuff myself....

Original comment by isawdrones@gmail.com on 27 Sep 2009 at 8:21

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It seems that using the palm namesapce unlocks more features in the audio 
service, which are otherwise 
unavailable.  I am waiting until 1.2.1 drops before I invest much time in this 
because it could very well change.

Original comment by bjgeiser@gmail.com on 27 Sep 2009 at 5:54

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Just wondering what the status of this issue is.

Original comment by globexde...@gmail.com on 18 Oct 2009 at 4:33

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Will be in the next release.  Turns out fixing this created a lot of extra work 
but I
have it 95% complete now and it's working pretty well.

Original comment by bjgeiser@gmail.com on 25 Oct 2009 at 5:52

• Changed state: AvailableInNextVersion

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Original comment by bjgeiser@gmail.com on 29 Oct 2009 at 3:04

• Changed state: Fixed