Jellyfin for Android TV v0.20 release plan

[nielsvanvelzen]

The next major release of our Android TV app is coming. Version 0.20 is a significant upgrade over 0.19 and will bump its server requirement to Jellyfin 10.11 or newer.

This discussion will be used to share updates about the release. The first beta will be released in the coming week(s), after which you can expect another version every 1 to 2 weeks until I feel good about the stability.

Each release will use a slow rollout (including the non-beta releases). This means not all users will get the update at the same time, it might take a few days.

If you have feedback or bugs related to the changes in this release: please do not comment here, open an issue instead! Questions related to the release plan can be asked in this discussions comments.

[Dnkhatri]

Are you updating the minimum android version?

[nielsvanvelzen]

Yes, as mentioned in the blog post for the 0.19 release we'll be requiring Android 6 or newer. Devices running Android 5 or Android 5.1 are no longer supported.
We'll also be dropping Android 6 support (and requiring Android 7 or newer) starting with 0.21.

These requirements are forced upon us by Google, nothing we can do about it.

[robobeau]

I recall seeing some back and forth with regards to ASS subtitle support. Will 0.20 have better support for them, or is there still an issue with libass or somesuch?

Also, thank you for all the work on this client!

[alpha-tango-kilo]

If you want to test some powerful ASS subtitles, I have a repro attached here that used to crash an alternative client when trying to direct play: damontecres/Wholphin#1561

it should be noted the ASS subtitles go beyond just "karaoke subs with special effects" and are extremely complex with blurring and static effects

---

We use the libass library for it, which should give you the same result as the current transcode pipeline and other video players like VLC and MPV

To caveat this, ExoPlayer + libass (which from a cursory glance I guess is the combination being used here) unfortunately doesn't have perfect subtitle syncing - or plans to support it - which can be noticeable with karaoke subs and typeset signs (i.e. subtitles masking in-scene signs). See androidx/media#2289. MPV does not have this issue (unsure about VLC)

[slackerlinux85]

If you want to test some powerful ASS subtitles, I have a repro attached here that used to crash an alternative client when trying to direct play: damontecres/Wholphin#1561

it should be noted the ASS subtitles go beyond just "karaoke subs with special effects" and are extremely complex with blurring and static effects

We use the libass library for it, which should give you the same result as the current transcode pipeline and other video players like VLC and MPV

To caveat this, ExoPlayer + libass (which from a cursory glance I guess is the combination being used here) unfortunately doesn't have perfect subtitle syncing - or plans to support it - which can be noticeable with karaoke subs and typeset signs (i.e. subtitles masking in-scene signs). See androidx/media#2289. MPV does not have this issue (unsure about VLC)

the 1st repro extracted ass file is like 13MB and i didnt see any timestamp past 1minute best i have found is 3mb and that does slow those used to crash but now only slows down not sure if exoplayer did a fix or somewhere else

doing similar stuff to mine(examples below)
from line 8457 in my file to 8483 is a single chinese character doing minor changes to the event

Dialogue: 2,0:01:52.70,0:01:54.26,Default,,0,0,0,fx,{\an5\move(876,696,876,696)\fscx187\bord0.462963\fscy187\t(0,500,\fscx100\bord0.462963\fscy100)\alpha&Hf1&\3c&Hd9f3e2&)\c&HC3FF4D&\shad0\fnHanyiSentyZhao}的

then below that theres even more god knows what thats doing theres like the same amount of those

Dialogue: 0,0:01:54.02,0:01:54.02,Default,,0,0,0,fx,{\move(820.000000,696.000000,820.000000,696.000000,0.000000,241.000000)876696\frz322\an7\bord1\blur5\3c&HC3FF4D&\1c&HFFFFFF&\fscx67\fscy67\shad0\p1}m 0 -23 l -8 -11 l -23 -7 l -13 4 l -14 19 l 0 13 l 14 19 l 13 4 l 23 -7 l 8 -11

then it moves on to the next character on screen till its done all of thsoe then it goes and does english all over again like i said i think jellyfin is fine struggling with these files i think the files themselves are broken because of the crap they are doing. havent tried playing your sample i am curious if its just slow in jellyfin or if it crashes after all a 1min sample and already 98,884 lines is crazy id hate to know how many lines are in the full thing. i dont see as much black magic in your file but theres definitly alot more events layered on. couldve missed alot its hard to skim through a large file and see everything. sofar 3meg for a full episode is best i have seen in my own collection relooking at what i had issues with before and havent had a crash since i updated to newest code only slowdowns on the previous worst offenders will keep looking though

[alpha-tango-kilo]

i didnt see any timestamp past 1minute

Yeah it's just the opening karaoke subs, not the entire episode. Fan subbers go crazy sometimes, I think it's cool, though it can make TV hardware show its weakness sometimes 😛

I have not tried playing the original episode or that repro on the new Jellyfin beta release, but given it works in Wholphin using ExoPlayer, I would expect it to be handled okay by Jellyfin too, since its the same backend tech.

[MrGcGamer]

tried the master branch from like 3-4 days ago and so far had no problems with ASS Subtitles.. will switch over to the beta next

[slackerlinux85]

the repro file does chug quite bad but doesnt crash! the rest play just fine(from what i can tell) that was provided in your bug report. prob helps a ton since video and audio is cut out and its only 1080p. tried with the setting aswell and did see a small change but still choppy. main thing is it doesnt crash. cool effects but not sure if its 13MB worth surely they could use so much less and do just as good.

[nielsvanvelzen]

v0.20.0-beta.1

The first beta is here! This one will only be available for people that manually install the APK, if no major issues are reported the next one will be pushed to the Google Play beta track as well.

[robobeau]

For what it's worth, I've been trying out the new beta with some GameCenter CX fansubs, which are typically heavily subtitled w/ ASS, and encoded in AV1. I would typically re-encode these files because Plex flat-out cannot play them properly on my Google TV Streamer, and the new beta (with ASS direct play enabled) is handling them just fine. 👌

It's worth noting both Plex and this beta threw an error at the start of one of these episodes, but Jellyfin continued playing without further issues. 💪

Great work all around!

[MrGcGamer]

I have tried the beta now a bit, and it seems to work fine so far

[Pentaphon]

The first beta is here!

So there's no player redesign yet?

[nielsvanvelzen]

The player redesign is only available in development builds (e.g. debug variant of non-tagged builds) for now, and I would not recommend it for daily use yet.

[DiWa51]

Since 1st 0.20 beta 1 and then beta 2 (apk downloaded from Jellyfin), running on latest v12.1 backend, I can no longer change language nor subtitles with default player is this a known issue? Are these builds integrating this player redesign?

[MrGcGamer]

..where do I find the client logs?

[MrGcGamer]

Jellyfin restart didn't fix it, but android reboot did

[robobeau]

Have you enabled the "Direct Play ASS subtitles" option? It's under Playback > Advanced Playback Preferences

[MrGcGamer]

Yes

[nielsvanvelzen]

v0.20.0-beta.2

About a week later and not much changes (yet). This release fixes a crash when accessing the license section in the settings and updates dependencies. The media3 dependency updates fixes a few playback issues that were reported in chat.

This one will be available on the Google Play beta track, with a slow rollout.