Audio problems with HTML5 since latest Chrome updates on Android
Aug 27, 2015
Hi,
I am currently evaluating Storyline 2 to replace our current e-learning software and for this I've created a test story.
This one contains slides playing mp4 movies and slides with multiple choices containing audio voiceovers.
Everything went well until some recent chrome update on android.
The story goes like this:
- Slide with MP4 movie jumping to next slide when media (or timeline) ends.
- Multiple choice slide (introduction audio) with answers on layers containing a jump to next slide button.
- Slide with MP4 movie jumping to next slide when media (or timeline) ends.
- Multiple choice slide (introduction audio) with answers on layers containing a jump to next slide button.
(repeating this for around 10 times).
Everything was running ok almost everywhere until some quite recent chrome update on android.
Now the audio on the multiple choices slides is only played for the first MC slide. The following multiple choices slides aren't playing audio anymore. But the inbetween movies slide still plays correctly.
After a lot of head scratching I've uninstalled chrome updates on my android test device (galaxy s5) and everything plays normally...
For debugging purposes I've added Jump to next slide buttons on the movies slides and noticed that if i don't let the movie play fully and the timeline end, the audio works in the MC choices...
Seems that something in the latest chrome update broke something :/
Any ideas or suggestions ?
Thanks a lot!
38 Replies
Hi people,
Looking around about the progress on this issue at chrome side, it looks like some folks found a quite "clean" workaround to resolve the issue while waiting for a maybe-will-never-come fix from chrome devs:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/32236156/webaudio-sound-stops-on-chrome-for-android-after-about-2-minutes/33155239#33155239
(check the accepted answer)
I guess it could be integrated in storyline html5/js output ?
I would test it but as sl2 javascript output is ofuscated, it's very hard to manually try it modifying the js code...
Cheers,
Marc
Thanks Marc for sharing that here - it's well outside my wheelhouse or our area of support, but hopefully someone in the community is able to assist! You may want to share what you have done/set up so far in regards to the JS code so that folks could spot anything off with that?
Hi Ashley,
again almost 15 days are gone.
The audio problem now is discussed in this thread for over 5 months. Articulate has to react now. If there is no solution in sight the android support is no longer sustainable. Articulate should inform official about the current problems on the website.
What is Articulate going to do now? The least is to inform your customers now about the planning.
Thanks
Hi Evelyn,
It is still with our team and we're continuing to press Google for updates as well but currently I don't have any further information in regards to a fix on our end. I do know another user mentioned using the workaround here, although it's a bit of a hack.
I am going to escalate your comments here to our team so that they have some additional intel on the impact this is having and your thoughts in regards to our Android support.
Hi Ashley,
thank you for the response and for escalating my comments!
Could you please inform me in which place and in which file we could insert the workaround?
Hi Evelyn,
Just an update - we did talk with our team recently about this and they confirmed that the bug within Chrome has been assigned to someone at Google - that's a good sign! If you watch that bug we've linked to you'll see their comments as well and we'll continue to keep an eye on it.
Javacript is entirely out of my wheelhouse and not something I'm able to offer support for - did you look at commenting in that post to see if there is someone to assist you?
I have had nothing but problems with audio for iPad and Android. If it works on one, it does not seem to work on the other. I have the most recent version of Storyline, and when I publish out the HTML5 version, audio does not play.
Hi Christine,
Is the audio not playing on both the iPad and Android? Which version/browsers are you using on each? You'll want to ensure you're using it within the supported environments as detailed in that article. As for Chrome on the Android, there is a known issue on Chrome's side right now and per their documented bug here it looks like it'll be fixed in the next update.
Hi all,
Just wanted to share an update on the issue in this forum thread and documented here in our KB articles, that Google has released a fix in Chrome 49 for Android. Update your Chrome app to allow your Storyline courses to work properly.
Hi,
I am facing issues with audio while playing SL2 files on mobile. A few days back all the SL2 (HTML5) files were playing well on Chrome using mobile but now the audios are not playing. This issue is not there on desktop view. We tried using other browsers as well and faced the same issue. Any suggestions?
Regards,
Sarprit Kaur
Oh no, Sarprit! So sorry you're running into that-- I'm happy to help track down the culprit here.
Can you share your unpublished .story project file here so I can do some testing? You can add it as an attachment to a comment like this:
Really appreciate it!
Hi,
Please find attached the unpublished file with this comment. Thank you.
Hi Sarprit, thanks for allowing me to take a look at your file! Our team tested it on Chrome for Android, and we were able to hear the audio without a problem. Could you please test this link and let us know if you can hear the audio, as well? Thanks!
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