CODEWITHSUNDEEP
android
Rob Stevenson-Leggett
Rob Stevenson-Leggett

Reputation: 35679

Android: How to keep reference to Media Player?

I'm building an application which players sound using the Media Player class.

If I use the back button to go to the menu and then reopen the app the music is still playing but if I play another track, the app seems to create a new media player. I can't put a reference saved instance state because it isn't serializble.

What's the recommended technique for keeping the reference?

Regards.

Upvotes: 0

Views: 1450

Answers (2)

John K
John K

Reputation: 506

Take a look at the lifecycle diagram of Activity, and make sure you're not creating multiple MediaPlayer objects without releasing the old ones. http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/Activity.html

Are you using MediaPlayer.create()? That allocates a new MediaPlayer object, but doesn't do anything to the old one. Call release() before calling create() a second time.

playSound(){
  mp.release();
  mp = MediaPlayer.create();
  mp.start();
}

If you're managing it manually try putting your calls in these places.

    onCreate(){
      mp=new MediaPlayer();
    }
    onDestroy(){
      mp.release();
      wl.release();
    }
    playSound(){
      mp.reset();
      mp.setDatasource();
      mp.prepare();
      mp.start();
    }
    stopSound(){
     mp.reset();
    }

To keep the sound playing

onCreate(){
  PowerManager pm = (PowerManager) getSystemService(POWER_SERVICE);
  wl = pm.newWakeLock(PowerManager.PARTIAL_WAKE_LOCK, "com.pzizz");
}
playSound(){    
  wl.acquire();
}
onDestroy(){
  wl.release();
}
stopSound(){
  wl.release();
}

add this to your manifest for wakelock permissions: 

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.WAKE_LOCK" />

Upvotes: 1

Nick Campion
Nick Campion

Reputation: 10479

I would recommend you place your MediaPlayer behind a Service. I've found that a really good example of how to do this, as well as bind to that service and play media, is the NPR Radio app which is open source. You can find the source here

Upvotes: 2

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