[android-developers] Video streaming plus UI control update thread

Hey there,

I hope everyone's week is off to a good start!

I have a pretty simple use case: I am playing video streamed across the network in an app, and I need to update two SeekBars every second, one which tracks the video's timecode while playing, and the other which tracks the device volume. Simple enough, gun up a background thread, and update both every second (given that to my knowledge, I can't have the system call a listener specific to either of those functions. In a nutshell, the video streams just fine when this control-updating thread isn't running, but when it is running, the video is so chunky and slow, and audio garbled, that it isn't watchable.

First, the video display is accomplished using a TextureView in combination with a MediaPlayer (the reason is that the TextureView allows scrolling / movement, SurfaceView does not). Second, I have tried a couple of different approaches for the background thread:

a) I have tried a Runnable in a new Thread which updates the SeekBar controls inside of a runOnUIThread — this keeps a looping background thread and updates the controls on the UI thread, as such:

new Thread(new ManagementRunnable()).start();
...
public class ManagementRunnable implements Runnable
{
public void run()
{
try
{
updateControlState();
Thread.sleep(1000);
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
...
public void updateControlState()
{
runOnUiThread(new Runnable()
{
public void run()
{
// update the timecode SeekBar
...
// update the volume SeekBar
...
}
}
}

b) I have also tried using a Handler, where it runs on the UI thread, as such:

new Handler().post(new ManagementRunnable());
...
public class ManagementRunnable implements Runnable
{
public void run()
{
try
{
updateControlState();
handler.postDelayed(this, 1000);
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
}

public void updateControlState()
{
// update the timecode SeekBar
...
// update the volume SeekBar
...
}

The problem is, the result is the same regardless of which approach is taken — the video is unwatchable. I have tested this on a Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket, and in the simulator. I've Googled this a fair amount, and it appears that the approaches above are generally the recommended approach. While video decoding and playing isn't exactly a cheap operation, I'm a little surprised that accommodating a once-per-second update brought the app to its knees, given nothing else taking place in the app.

If anyone has any insight, I would really appreciate it.

Thanks,

Brad

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