71. Video Playback on Android using the VideoView and MediaController Classes

One of the primary uses for smartphones and tablets is to provide access to online content. One key form of content widely used, especially in the case of tablet devices, is video.

The Android SDK includes two classes that make the implementation of video playback on Android devices extremely easy to implement when developing applications. This chapter will provide an overview of these two classes, VideoView and MediaController, before working through the creation of a video playback application.

71.1 Introducing the Android VideoView Class

By far the simplest way to display video within an Android application is to use the VideoView class. This is a visual component which, when added to the layout of an activity, provides a surface onto which a video may be played. Android currently supports the following video formats:

•H.263

•H.264 AVC

•H.265 HEVC

•MPEG-4 SP

•VP8

•VP9

The VideoView class has a wide range of methods that may be called in order to manage the playback of video. Some of the more commonly used methods are as follows:

•setVideoPath(String path) – Specifies the path (as a string) of the video media to be played. This can be either the URL of a remote video file or a video file local to the device.

•setVideoUri(Uri uri) – Performs the same task as the setVideoPath() method but takes a Uri object as an argument instead of a string.

•start() – Starts video...

71.2 Introducing the Android MediaController Class

If a video is simply played using the VideoView class, the user will not be given any control over the playback, which will run until the end of the video is reached. This issue can be addressed by attaching an instance of the MediaController class to the VideoView instance. The MediaController will then provide a set of controls allowing the user to manage the playback (such as pausing and seeking backwards/forwards in the video time-line).

The position of the controls is designated by anchoring the controller instance to a specific view in the user interface layout. Once attached and anchored, the controls will appear briefly when playback starts and may subsequently be restored at any point by the user tapping on the view to which the instance is anchored.

Some of the key methods of this class are as follows:

•setAnchorView(View view) – Designates the view to which the controller is to be anchored. This...

71.3 Creating the Video Playback Example

The remainder of this chapter will create an example application intended to use the VideoView and MediaController classes to play an MPEG-4 video file.

Select the Create New Project quick start option from the welcome screen and, within the resulting new project dialog, choose the Empty Activity template before clicking on the Next button.

Enter VideoPlayer into the Name field and specify com.ebookfrenzy.videoplayer as the package name. Before clicking on the Finish button, change the Minimum API level setting to API 26: Android 8.0 (Oreo) and the Language menu to Java.

Designing the VideoPlayer Layout

The user interface for the main activity will consist solely of an instance of the VideoView class. Use the Project tool window to locate the app -> res -> layout -> activity_main.xml file, double-click on it, switch the Layout Editor tool to Design mode and delete the default TextView widget.

From the Widgets category...

71.4 Downloading the Video File

The video that will be played by the VideoPlayer app is a short animated movie clip encoded in MPEG-4 format. Using a web browser, navigate to the following URL to play the video:

https://www.ebookfrenzy.com/android_book/movie.mp4

Staying within the browser window, right-click on the video playback and select the option to save or download the video to a local file and choose a suitable temporary filesystem location, naming the file movie.mp4.

Within Android Studio, locate the res folder in the Project tool window, right-click on it and select the New -> Directory menu option and enter raw into the name field before clicking on the OK button. Using the filesystem navigator for your operating system, locate the movie.mp4 file downloaded above and copy it. Returning to Android Studio, right-click on the newly created raw directory and select the Paste option to copy the video file into the project. Once added, the raw folder should match Figure...

71.5 Configuring the VideoView

The next step is to configure the VideoView with the path of the video to be played and then start the playback. This will be performed when the main activity has initialized, so load the MainActivity.java file into the editor and modify it as outlined in the following listing:

package com.ebookfrenzy.videoplayer;

 

import androidx.appcompat.app.AppCompatActivity;

import android.os.Bundle;

import android.widget.VideoView;

import android.net.Uri;

 

public class MainActivity extends AppCompatActivity {

 

    private VideoView videoView;

 

    @Override

    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {

        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);

        setContentView(R.layout.activity_video_player);

       ...

71.6 Adding the MediaController to the Video View

As the VideoPlayer application currently stands, there is no way for the user to control playback. As previously outlined, this can be achieved using the MediaController class. To add a controller to the VideoView, modify the configureVideoView() method once again:

package com.ebookfrenzy.videoplayer;

 

import androidx.appcompat.app.AppCompatActivity;

import android.os.Bundle;

import android.widget.VideoView;

import android.net.Uri;

import android.widget.MediaController;

 

public class MainActivity extends AppCompatActivity {

 

       private VideoView videoView;

       private MediaController mediaController;

.

.

    private void configureVideoView() {

 

        final VideoView videoView =

       ...

71.7 Setting up the onPreparedListener

As a final example of working with video based media, the activity will now be extended further to demonstrate the mechanism for configuring a listener. In this case, a listener will be implemented that is intended to output the duration of the video as a message in the Android Studio Logcat panel. The listener will also configure video playback to loop continuously:

package com.ebookfrenzy.videoplayer;

 

import android.support.v7.app.AppCompatActivity;

import android.os.Bundle;

import android.widget.VideoView;

import android.net.Uri;

import android.widget.MediaController;

import android.util.Log;

import android.media.MediaPlayer;

 

public class MainActivity extends AppCompatActivity {

 

    private VideoView videoView;

    private MediaController mediaController;

    String TAG = "VideoPlayer";

 

 ...

71.8 Summary

Android devices make excellent platforms for the delivery of content to users, particularly in the form of video media. As outlined in this chapter, the Android SDK provides two classes, namely VideoView and MediaController, which combine to make the integration of video playback into Android applications quick and easy, often involving just a few lines of Java code.