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Troubleshooting Guide

Purpose

To present a comprehensive list of the common problems JW Player Users experience and provide solutions to those issues.

Our troubleshooting guide is designed to help you resolve some problems that we see quite frequently. If you are unable to solve your issue after reading through this document, please visit our support forum or e-mail our support team. Make sure that you have performed our preliminary steps as recommended in our How to Troubleshoot the JW Player section.

Contents

How To Troubleshoot the JW Player

Before you try anything else...

We recommend you try the following simple steps, which often fix the vast majority of issues users encounter.

  1. Reload the web page. If this doesn't resolve your issue, move on to step 2.
  2. Clear your browser's cache, then reload the web page. Didn’t work? Proceed to step 3.
  3. Clear your browser's cache once more, restart your browser, then navigate back to the page you were on.

If none of these actions resolve your problem, try to identify the class or source of your issue and see if you can find a solution below.

Narrowing down the issue

We have a standard operating procedure for troubleshooting the JW Player. After clearing the cache and restarting the browser, we generally run each of the following tests, in no particular order.

If you're having a problem, it's pretty likely that other people are having an issue too!

Feel free to search for additional information on our support forums and in our list of trouble tickets.

Common Issues

I don't see the player anywhere on the page

Most likely, this is due either to an error with your embed code or a JavaScript error that's causing SWFObject to fail. To resolve this problem:

I have an error message

Look for the error in our trusty error guide!

My player freezes in the middle of the loading screen

Before the player starts up, it must load the following: its configuration, its assigned skin, any MediaProviders, chosen plugins and the playlist. If the configuration, skin, or playlist fails, the player will halt startup and display an error screen.

Failure of any of these are generally caused by the same three issues:

My player appears, but the video does not play

I'm testing from a web page saved on my local computer

Playing remote files and most plugins will not work when testing locally due to security restrictions.

I'm using a playlist

Flash security often prevents a player from loading playlists. For more information on how to resolve this issue, see Flash Security.

I'm using an H.264-encoded video

H.264 video only works with Flash Player 9.0.28.0 or higher. If you use the SWFObject JavaScript to embed your player, you can activate the auto-update functionality.

I'm using a WebM video

WebM is a fairly new file format that became relevant when Google open-sourced it for use in the HTML5 <video> tag. Therefore, webservers may not set the correct mimetype, causing Firefox, Opera and Chrome to not play the video. The mimetype must be video/webm.

You can check if the mimetype is correct by using a developer console like Firebug and then search for the WebM file request in the Resources section. If the type is not set to video/webm, change it to fix the issue:

I'm using a YouTube video

If you're using player version 5.5 and below: Make sure that you've uploaded the yt.swf to the same directory as the player.swf. The yt.swf serves as a small proxy; it was included in the player download until 5.6. This file is no longer necessary in player versions 5.6 and above.

I'm using an IIS server

The FLV mime type hasn't been added to your server. If you're a web server administrator, here's how to fix it; otherwise contact your system admin.

My video never stops buffering

Two things can cause your player to buffer continuously:

My video plays, but something is wrong

My audio file is playing, but the playback is too fast or too slow

Your file likely contains variable bitrate encoding or unsupported sample frequencies (e.g. 48Khz). Please stick to constant bitrate encoding and 11, 22, 33 or 44 kHz. If you need a free MP3 encoder, check out iTunes.

I can't seek: the progress bar isn't running

Most likely, this occurs when your file doesn't have metadata or the Flash Player doesn't understand your metadata. You can fix this by using this application.

I can't seek: I'm using an MP4 file

If your MP4 files cannot be seeked before they are completely downloaded, you will have to fix the MOOV atom (it contains the seeking information) located at the end of your video. Use this little application to parse your videos and add the necessary cue points.

I can't seek: I'm using a live stream

If you're watching a live stream, the progress bar should remain static. If you'd like to seek within a live stream, you'll need to set up a server that supports DVR functionality and configure the player appropriately.

My video seems stretched or there are black bars around my video

The likely culprit here is that you’ve set your stretching FlashVar incorrectly. Try the other stretching options to see if that resolves the issue.

It’s also possible that your file doesn't have metadata, or the Flash Player doesn't understand your metadata. You can fix this by using this application.

I'm having trouble going into full screen

Full-screen mode only works with Flash Player 9.0.28.0 or higher. If you use the SWFObject JavaScript to embed your player, you can activate the auto-update functionality. And don't forget to set the allowfullscreen parameter to true in your embed code.

I'm having trouble with a plugin or JavaScript interaction

Make sure to try everything outlined in Narrowing down the issue, as there are many issues that can be caused by a specific browser or HTML page.

I'm testing on my local machine

JavaScript interaction files doesn’t work when testing locally, due to security restrictions. Also note that JavaScript interaction doesn't work for SWF files inside a <form> tag.

I'm using the playerReady() function

If you're using playerReady, make sure that the player has an ID or name or that the id FlashVar is set. Trying to reference the player without these being set will often cause problems.

My plugin is not working correctly

In the course of writing a plugin, you may hit some slight snags trying to get it to work with a player in a testing page. In which case, we recommend that you:

Using the Player Setup Wizard

The player setup wizard is a powerful tool can help you determine the cause of your error.

Note that you may have to alter your domain's crossdomain security policy to allow requests from longtailvideo.com in order for this to work. For more information, see Flash Security.

Verifying File Locations

Often times, the hardest part of getting the player to work correctly is referencing files correctly. Use a proxy, like Charles or Firebug for Firefox, in order to make sure that your system is attempting to access the file in the correct location.

When using relative links to MP3, image and XML files, you should always start from the location of the HTML in which the SWF is embedded. The one exception is that the path of FLV files should be given relatively from the SWF file. In order to prevent confusion, you can always point to files using an absolute URL (including the "http://www").

Flash Security

Due to security restrictions, Flash can only import files and metadata if they reside on the same domain as the SWF file. This can create issues for playlists, images, audio, videos, SWFs, and ID3 data as the player SWF may not be located on the same domain as the media. A workaround for this is to use a simple crossdomain.xml file, which should be installed in the root of the site that contains the media.

For more information, please see our Flash Security tutorial.

Escaping FlashVars

Since ?, = and & are used to stack the FlashVars, they cannot be used in the FlashVars themselves. By escaping these FlashVars, the problem can be solved. Therefore, replace the three symbols with their escaped strings and unescape() them again in the SWF as follows:

  1. ? -> %3F
  2. = -> %3D
  3. & -> %26

Clearing Your Flash Cookies

The JW Player, and some of it plugins, may store cookies on your computer using Flash's built-in cookie mechanism. If they fall into an inconsistent state, a problem could arise. To clear your Flash cookies, go to the Flash Player Website Privacy Settings panel and click 'Delete all sites'.

Setting up the Flash Debug Player and Debug Output

Adobe's Flash Player provides support for debugging the output log file using it's debugging players. Even after you've installed a debugging player, you'll need to configure it.

If you're having issues, you should enable debugging in the JW Player. This can be done by right-clicking on any player and then clicking on "Debugging to…". Repeating this process will cycle through the list of available debugging options: