MP3 Player Robustness

[George]

There appears to be a lack of robustness with the new IM5 embedded MP3 player.

I am preparing material for a DVD photo slide show of a wedding. This is to be accompanied by 2 music tracks (provided by the couple). Both these tracks are sourced from the same origin - both appear to have similar Metadata format info (MP3). One track plays within IM5 the other is refused - saying "this format cannot be played". I obtained the download link and downloaded both tracks from the supplier myself - in case something had been damaged - but with the same result. Both files play with windows media player, and both play with VLC.

I subsequently loaded the 'problem' file into VLC and re-saved it using the inbuilt converter. This file now plays with the IM5 MP3 player.

This appears to me to be similar to the difficulties we have with the in-built video player. I very much support the concept of integrating the video and mp3 players into IM5 - and for projects like this one, it has the potential to be very useful. Fortunately IM 5's ability to seamlessly pass files to other apps (like VLC Media Player) provides a useful workaround. Its not a huge problem - and I understand the licensing difficulties,  but at some point I would very much like to see these 2 inbuilt apps being replaced with something more robust. 

[Mario]

This is not an IMatch MP3 player. The sample App relies on the HTML 5 <audio> tag and just instructs Internet Explorer to play the file. If IE refuses the file, it does not like it and there is nothing I can do about this. Make sure you have the most recent IE installed (usually this is automatic via Windows update).
This is a sample app to demonstrate how IMatch users can create functioning HTML5 and JavaScript-based audio Apps. Not more. So far it played MP3's i tried, and I've tried maybe a 1,000 or so.

This appears to me to be similar to the difficulties we have with the in-built video player.

If you mean the "Media App": This App can play videos, but supports only the formats Internet Explorer supports, and the formats recommended by the HTML 5 standard. The main purpose of this app is how to use the built-in mediaplayer in IE. If IE get's better, the app gets better too. Problem with videos are the hundreds of patents involved in playing even the simplest video snippet. This is why no browser supports all video formats etc. VLC is special because it's open source and free and gets special treatment by the patent holder companies. You can create an App which embeds VLC if you like. There should be samples on the web which show how to achieve this. Then upload the better App so other users can use it to.


When you quick view a video file, IMatch loads the file into a component provided by Windows to play video files. This may work, or not. There are so many video files and variants around, and Windows does not play many files "out-of-the-box" for licensing and patent issues (e.g. anything Apple has patents for). The ability to play videos directly in IMatch is cool, but to do it right I would need to embed VLC (cannot, because of the license it uses) or QuickTime (similar issues, and potentially annual royalties I would have to pay to Apple) and similar issues. Better to play whatever Windows plays, and let users just call up their favorite MediaPlayer, VLC or QuickTime for the rest.

[George]

Mario - thanks - very useful info to assist me understand how these functions work. This 'problem' is no great deal as the ability of IM5 to seamlessly pass over files to other apps (like VLC) for video and sound is really great - this plus IM5's ability to function as a central co-coordinating, organizing and management 'HUB' is really helpful with workflow management - thanks for a great product.