Can Firefox responses to .wav links be made equal to .mp3 links
Links to the same recorded sound in .wav format and .mp3 format are created in a html document. The setup in Firefox Tools | Options | Applications for .wav and .mp3 formats is identical. The Firefox response to these formats is very different. The processing of .wav files by Firefox appears to be defective. The problem is graphically explained by the attached image.
IT WOULD BE, IF THERE WAS A BROWSE BUTTON AS DESCRIBED IN THE HELP SECTION OF THIS FIREFOX 33.1.1! "You now have a screenshot that you can add to your forum question by clicking the Browse button below the Post a Reply box. "
But it can still be seen at www.discway.com.au/cmad/Example.png
All Replies (4)
The player on the right in the screenshot is the built-in HTML5 media player that can play MP3 files if support on the OS level is available and enabled (media.directshow.enabled = true). The player on the left is the VLC media player that is using a plugin. It is possible that the player needs to be loaded and that can take extra time. Firefox can only play a limited number of media file formats internally and only simple .wav files.
Thanks for your response. It does appear that FF is loading the VLC plug-in. The FF Application chart (shown in the image) is misleading in that playing mp3 also requires the VLC plug-in.
The OS is Win XP with SP3 and I would think the .wav file is about as simple as one can get for audio and would fit the Firefox parameters referenced in the Help Information "Firefox can play the WAV container format (.wav, .wave file types) containing uncompressed audio in PCM at 8 or 16 bits per sample." Here is the .wav file info:
Audio Format : PCM Format settings, Endianness : Little Format settings, Sign : Signed Codec ID : 1 Duration : 2s 200ms Bit rate mode : Constant Bit rate : 705.6 Kbps Channel(s) : 1 channel Sampling rate : 44.1 KHz Bit depth : 16 bits Stream size : 190 KiB (100%)
Regards
There is usually an error message in the Web Console (Firefox/Tools > Web Developer) if there are problems with the HTML5 media player playing a specific file.
Opening the html file, clicking on the link, waiting for the audio and display of the vlc icon, under the same tab, Tools | Web Developer | Web Console is clear. Perhaps that indicates FF does not attempt to use the internal player for .wav files.
However, this test had already passed through the phase where the first click on the .wav link after opening the document did not activate the player. Attempting to reproduce that situation did not reproduce the phenomena, but various combinations of `first click' will be tried until it is re-producible.