AVPlayer will not stream M4A over HTTP Live Streaming

Question

I am writing an iOS app and I need to stream m4a files over HTTP Live Streaming. I am using AVPlayer and a HLS Simple Media Playlist file.

If I link AVPlayer directly to an mp3 or m4a, it streams with no issues.

URL = [NSURL URLWithString:@"http://fembotics.com/bells.m4a"];
item = [AVPlayerItem playerItemWithURL:URL];
player = [AVPlayer playerWithPlayerItem:item];
[player play];

The problem happens when I set URL to a HLS playlist. Strangely, mp3 works and m4a does not.

http://fembotics.com/basicmp3.m3u8 - Working

#EXTM3U
#EXT-X-VERSION:3
#EXT-X-TARGETDURATION:5220
#EXTINF:20.0,
/bells.mp3
#EXT-X-ENDLIST

http://fembotics.com/basicm4a.m3u8 - Broken

#EXTM3U
#EXT-X-VERSION:3
#EXT-X-TARGETDURATION:5220
#EXTINF:20.0,
/bells.m4a
#EXT-X-ENDLIST

I tried using absolute URLs in the playlists and it makes no difference.

Has anyone seen this type of issue before? Should I try other sources for my m4a files? (I tried one purchased from iTunes and one transcoded from wav by MediaHuman Audio Converter).

Answer 1

m3u8 on iOS only supports segmented .aac an .ts containers.