HLS bug in new Roku firmware

[pudds]

Hi all,

 

There is an acknowledge bug in the latest (Jan 14, 2015) firmware for Roku devices which may affect some channels using HLS streams.

 

If your channel redirects to an M3U8 file which points directly at the segments, instead of at a master playlist with multiple bitrates, launching the HLS video may cause the roku to crash and reboot.

 

Fortunately, there is a workaround.  If you set the bitrate in your MediaObject container (in the MediaObjectsForUrl method) to "0", the Roku will accept the stream without issue.

 

For example, instead of this:

		return [
			MediaObject(
				optimized_for_streaming=True,
				parts = [PartObject(key=HTTPLiveStreamURL(Callback(callback, url=video_url)))],
				bitrate = 2048,
				video_resolution = 720
			)
		]

Use this:

		return [
			MediaObject(
				optimized_for_streaming=True,
				parts = [PartObject(key=HTTPLiveStreamURL(Callback(callback, url=video_url)))],
				bitrate = 0,
				video_resolution = 720
			)
		]

This obviously isn't ideal for any media which has multiple objects available, but it will at least work temporarily.  I'm not sure if this needs to be fixed in a future Roku update (they have acknowledged it as a bug, but not stated that a fix is in the works), or if this is something the Plex channel maintainers can fix.

 

For more information, you can view the thread on the roku forums here: http://forums.roku.com/viewtopic.php?f=34&t=82641&p=475751

 

Hope this saves someone else some time.

[Gerk]

Thanks for the heads up.  That might explain the crashes I've been seeing on my Roku for the last couple of days.  I would think they will be fairly quick to fix this stuff once it's confirmed.

[sjsaleem]

Is this the same issue reported on below Roku Forum?

http://forums.roku.com/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=84016&p=481319#p481319