CodecException: Error 0xffffffff

[KostyaLyapochkin]

Hi. A strange issue has come about in a project.

com.google.android.exoplayer2.ExoPlaybackException: Unexpected runtime error
        at com.google.android.exoplayer2.ExoPlayerImplInternal.handleMessage(ExoPlayerImplInternal.java:586)
        at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:98)
        at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:154)
        at android.os.HandlerThread.run(HandlerThread.java:61)
     Caused by: android.media.MediaCodec$CodecException: Error 0xffffffff
        at android.media.MediaCodec.native_setSurface(Native Method)
        at android.media.MediaCodec.setOutputSurface(MediaCodec.java:1901)
        at com.google.android.exoplayer2.mediacodec.SynchronousMediaCodecAdapter.setOutputSurface(SynchronousMediaCodecAdapter.java:165)
        at com.google.android.exoplayer2.video.MediaCodecVideoRenderer.setOutputSurfaceV23(MediaCodecVideoRenderer.java:1253)
        at com.google.android.exoplayer2.video.MediaCodecVideoRenderer.setSurface(MediaCodecVideoRenderer.java:556)
        at com.google.android.exoplayer2.video.MediaCodecVideoRenderer.handleMessage(MediaCodecVideoRenderer.java:507)
        at com.google.android.exoplayer2.ExoPlayerImplInternal.deliverMessage(ExoPlayerImplInternal.java:1502)
        at com.google.android.exoplayer2.ExoPlayerImplInternal.sendMessageToTarget(ExoPlayerImplInternal.java:1466)
        at com.google.android.exoplayer2.ExoPlayerImplInternal.sendMessageInternal(ExoPlayerImplInternal.java:1441)
        at com.google.android.exoplayer2.ExoPlayerImplInternal.handleMessage(ExoPlayerImplInternal.java:508)
        at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:98) 
        at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:154) 
        at android.os.HandlerThread.run(HandlerThread.java:61) 

As I said before this bug arises in the strange way. What happens? I had to add supporting of ad to the project so I used ExoPlayer’s ima extensions. The application supports rotation and I keep the player inside of a retain fragment.

It happens When the first ad is playing and I change the orientation of the device at the same time.
But when the main content is playing after rotation and the ad was in progress and then I try to change orientation again I will catch this exception moreover if I wait for a while and get the next ad and then I change orientation I will not catch this error. In other words I have this bug when rotation was changed when the ad was playing then it ended and then I change orientation again.

However, “codecNeedsSetOutputSurfaceWorkaround” helps to escape this error but I have a little delay therefore It’s not suitable for me.

Finally, Only emulators can work fine. I have this problem on almost all physical devices.
Honestly speaking, I have not been able to repeat this issue in a demo project.

Maybe the problem is that the retain fragment re-creates views... It means that a Surface is not ready to handle the player... Can It happen? I use Widevine DASH

[lcf87]

@andrewlewis Can you take a look? Basically MediaCodec.setOutputSurface errored out when rotating the device while an ad is playing.

[andrewlewis]

Are you handling the SurfaceView surface callbacks in your code? If so, please make sure you are using blocking calls to set/clear the output surface (like SimpleExoPlayer.setVideoSurface/clearVideoSurface), to make sure it can't be destroyed while the player is trying to use it.

There may be informative errors just before the stack trace from setOutputSurface is output, so it would be helpful if you could provide a snippet of logcat just before the error.

If that doesn't shed any light on it then we'd probably need a minimal sample project to reproduce the issue here.

[KostyaLyapochkin]

@andrewlewis Hi, I've decided to explain the error more exactly and how to replay this one:

1. The ad is playing
2. I change the orientation
3. Wait for the ad to end/finish
4. The main content starts playing
5. I change orientation again
6. The error appears

Also I am attaching a list of logs, please, take a look.
logs_exo_player.txt

[KostyaLyapochkin]

@andrewlewis Are there any updates?

[andrewlewis]

This logging just before the first error looks suspicious:

2021-03-31 15:22:48.073 3640-4549 E/SurfaceUtils: native window cannot handle protected buffers: the consumer should either be a hardware composer or support hardware protection

If you play a stream that doesn't require a secure decoder (like the sample streams with ad tags in the demo app) do you see the same behavior?

[KostyaLyapochkin]

@andrewlewis I've checked this case, so If I use HLS or Dash without encryption it will be work well. Actually this error appearance when the app uses DASH with encryption.