Topic: NEW: ChromeCast on JRemote2 for Android (Read 11258 times)

Hendrik · « **on:** May 13, 2020, 08:21:26 am »

In JRemote2 2.0.8 we introduced ChromeCast (Google Cast) support.

You can use ChromeCast to cast your media (audio and video) to ChromeCast devices. Many TVs and some audio devices have built-in ChromeCast support, or you can get a ChromeCast dongle from Google to augment any HDMI device with that functionality.

To use ChromeCast in JRemote2, start from an idle state in JRemote2 (nothing playing), and click the cast button in the top menu (a screen icon with three waves in the bottom corner). It'll bring up a dialog to select the device to cast to, and on selection it'll establish a cast session with that device. If your device has a display (ie. a TV), it should automatically swap to a JRemote2 cast scene.

Now simply pick the media you want to play in JRemote2, and it should cast to ChromeCast automatically.

Limitations:
- ChromeCast needs direct access to the Media Center server you are connected to
- ChromeCast does not work if you use a secure connection in JRemote2, but do not have a fully trusted certificate. The easiest work-around is to use an insecure connection on your local WiFi, and only use a secure connection for connection through mobile data from the outside of your network.

RoderickGI · « **Reply #1 on:** May 13, 2020, 09:17:34 pm »

I retested this today after rebooting the TV and phone. I got better results, but the user experience is still a bit variable.

The "JRemote2 cast scene" seems to just be a black screen with the words "JRiver JRemote" in the centre. That's fine. I know casting is on from that.

Yesterday the movie I was playing didn't appear in Playing Now, but today it did. So that was probably as a result of rebooting the TV. Or because I had played something locally on the phone prior to testing.

Tapping vs pressing and holding on a movie gives different results. Tapping was a bit inconsistent, but when it worked all movies in the View were added to Playing Now (well, a lot, I didn't check exactly which, just that the one I tapped was next to play). This behaviour is more suited to audio than video, but that is fine. Pressing and holding, then selecting "Play Now" added only the one movie to Playing Now, which is much preferred for movies.

The screens shown on the phone while a movie was playing seemed to vary depending on the format of the file being played. MP4 and AVI files were different to TS files. I was using the Low Quality video setting initially, and the High Quality setting later. Same results.

The movies still paused after a minute or so, with the spinning icon, and didn't recover.

I guess Chromecast will become more reliable when you change the streaming method.

Hendrik · « **Reply #2 on:** May 14, 2020, 03:10:44 am »

Quote from: RoderickGI on May 13, 2020, 09:17:34 pm

Tapping vs pressing and holding on a movie gives different results. Tapping was a bit inconsistent, but when it worked all movies in the View were added to Playing Now (well, a lot, I didn't check exactly which, just that the one I tapped was next to play). This behaviour is more suited to audio than video, but that is fine. Pressing and holding, then selecting "Play Now" added only the one movie to Playing Now, which is much preferred for movies.

The behavior on single press depends on the mode you have currently enabled. Either press the icon in the top bar to change it to single play, or find the setting in the three-dots menu in the top right (it might hide itself when the cast icon is present due to lack of space).

RoderickGI · « **Reply #3 on:** May 14, 2020, 07:58:27 pm »

I don't think I've ever seen the PlayMode icon in the top bar. But maybe that is because the Cast icon has always been present.

I guess my issue was that when in Audio, a PlayMode of "Play All Now" was most appropriate for me, but in Video a PlayMode of "Play Now" would work best. I don't suppose we could have different PlayMode settings for different media types?

Or maybe I just need to remember I have to change the PlayMode as required, or use the long press to show the options. $:-\$

DJLegba · « **Reply #4 on:** May 14, 2020, 08:16:52 pm »

Quote from: RoderickGI on May 14, 2020, 07:58:27 pm

I don't think I've ever seen the PlayMode icon in the top bar. But maybe that is because the Cast icon has always been present.

I guess my issue was that when in Audio, a PlayMode of "Play All Now" was most appropriate for me, but in Video a PlayMode of "Play Now" would work best. I don't suppose we could have different PlayMode settings for different media types?

Or maybe I just need to remember I have to change the PlayMode as required, or use the long press to show the options. $:-\$

Playmode doesn't show up in the top bar anywhere in JRemote2. When you've selected an album, you can touch the kebab control to find Playmode. And long press is only relevant when you touch an album. If you've touched the album and you get to the list of tracks, with the Play control at the top of the list, the Play control doesn't differentiate between a long press and a short press. It's a bit awkward if you're old enough to suffer from zombie finger and your storage device has gone to sleep and needs to spin up. Pressing play at that point only does what you've set as Playmode, and you may have to wait a few seconds for something to happen, but at that point you don't know if the app has registered your touch or not. So you touch and watch and wait, or you touch a couple of times and more often than not something happens that you didn't really want or expect.

EDIT: I never see a Playmode control on my Pixel 3 phone running Android 10. I do see it on my Samsung tablet running Android 9. On the tablet, when viewing the currently playing tracking with the album cover, tapping the <- control on the top left sends me to a screen listing all the album tracks, with the Cast, Search, Playmode, and hamburger menu controls at the top. On the phone, tapping <- at that point takes me back to the Audio screen where I can select groups like Artist or Genre.

Hendrik · « **Reply #5 on:** May 14, 2020, 11:10:42 pm »

The number of shown icons depends on the screen size, on most phones its usually 3 - but with the cast icon, we have 4. So it shows 2 + kebab menu (three dots), keeping cast and search, and hiding play mode and view mode. I would agree that without seeing them right away its a bit cumbersome, and the menu also doesn't even indicate which mode is currently active.

On a tablet, there is enough room to show all of them more often.

I thought we seperated play mode by root view already, like we do with viewtype, but apparently not. Maybe I can add that. Anything but single play is definitely not as useful for video.

RoderickGI · « **Reply #6 on:** May 15, 2020, 01:33:54 am »

Doh!

I just rotated my phone into landscape orientation, and now I can see the PlayMode icon... when I drill down through the Categories defined for the View to a point where there are single files to select. Or more correctly, when I have drilled into the bottom Category in the View definition.

Anyway, this has diverged a bit from the topic of Chromecast, but I guess icon visibility is all part of it.

stanzani · « **Reply #7 on:** June 02, 2020, 03:37:08 am »

thanks
are subtitles casted? e.g. vlc media player suffer of this: it cannot cast subtitles, they says in the forum that for this they have to encode again the full video with subs inserted. Videostream works with this
Using JRiver and Oppo as DLNA renderer does not work with subtitles

p.s. i did not try yet

Thanks

RoderickGI · « **Reply #8 on:** June 02, 2020, 04:12:14 pm »

Quote from: stanzani on June 02, 2020, 03:37:08 am

Using JRiver and Oppo as DLNA renderer does not work with subtitles

Subtitles work with DLNA, if you turn on "Present Subtitle Resources" in the DLNA Server Advanced settings. Whether the Oppo supports Subtitles sent via DLNA is another thing, but a search of the forum will probably tell you. I think it might.

Chromecast? I have no idea. If it requires re-encoding, I doubt it. It probably does require re-encoding to "burn in" the subtitles into the video frames.

Awesome Donkey · « **Reply #9 on:** June 09, 2020, 04:24:50 pm »

I just got a Google Nest Mini today and I got casting working nicely with it and JRemote2. However I must be blind or something, but I don't suppose there's a way I can disable conversions to MP3 while casting? Pretty sure the Nest Mini can playback FLAC.

Also, I don't suppose there's a way to get gapless playback working as well?

Hendrik · « **Reply #10 on:** June 09, 2020, 04:47:50 pm »

Cast is limited to MP3 currently.
It also just receives a playlist from me. What it does with that regarding track transitions is entirely up to it.

Peter_T · « **Reply #11 on:** December 26, 2020, 05:33:03 pm »

I'm having trouble casting... I can play a song locally on my phone, and when I click on the cast icon I hear my CC speaker make it's happy "connected" sound. Even my google home app shows the name of the song and an option to stop casting. But no sound is coming from the speaker. I checked the volume, since this is an odd one.

Other apps cast fine.

Thanks!

JimH · « **Reply #12 on:** December 26, 2020, 05:37:04 pm »

Try pressing the play button.

Peter_T · « **Reply #13 on:** December 26, 2020, 05:39:43 pm »

ha, thanks Jim. Play button was pressed a few times, it doesn't respond.

Peter_T · « **Reply #14 on:** December 26, 2020, 05:42:44 pm »

OK there's a problem on my side, I think it's something to do with how my server connects to my network ATM - through a wifi extender.

Chrome on my server can't see my CC devices, so I'll work on that.

Thanks all!

JimH · « **Reply #15 on:** December 26, 2020, 06:19:58 pm »

Power cycle everything.

jmone · « **Reply #16 on:** December 26, 2022, 01:57:54 pm »

Quote from: Hendrik on May 13, 2020, 08:21:26 am

- ChromeCast needs direct access to the Media Center server you are connected to
- ChromeCast does not work if you use a secure connection in JRemote2, but do not have a fully trusted certificate. The easiest work-around is to use an insecure connection on your local WiFi, and only use a secure connection for connection through mobile data from the outside of your network.

Found this post (after some frantic googling) when trying to cast old Christmas Home Videos using JR2 from my server in Sydney to a local TV. JR2 would play on my phone, could connect to the the TV's chromecast but would not play any videos. Turning off "Use Secure Connection" (under Edit Server) was the answer but we nearly gave up to work out what was wrong.

Suggestion: Would it be possible for JR2 to recognise when "Secure Connection" was not working and offer to turn this off? Or maybe a note that pops up with such advice?

Thanks
Nathan

edit: once we had it working, it kept the family entertained for hours and works superbly!

lepa · « **Reply #17 on:** December 27, 2022, 10:43:50 am »

Also been wondering why casting doesn't work with any remotes...

How is this supposed to be working with let's encrypt certificate?

I have created certificates with Certbot

Code: [Select]

Successfully received certificate.
Certificate is saved at: C:\Certbot\live\zzzz.yyy.org\fullchain.pem
Key is saved at:         C:\Certbot\live\zzzz.yyy.org\privkey.pem

and utilized those in MC's network settings.

Now I can use my dyndns address with web browser (panel) from outside of home network but none of the remote applications connect. Switching back to self created certificate and remote apps to work again but then casting doesn't work...

So is there a bug somewhere causing apps not working with real certicates or just user error? Has someone succeed in this?

Awesome Donkey · « **Reply #18 on:** December 27, 2022, 12:04:19 pm »

I thought it was a Chromecast limitation in general that it doesn't work with self-signed certificates or something like that? Then again, Let's Encrypt *should* work, as far as I know, hmmm.

I've also run into this issue a time or two.

lepa · « **Reply #19 on:** December 27, 2022, 12:09:29 pm »

Yes that might be the case. However I can't test if using signed cert would make the difference as with my Let's Encrypt signed certificate only remote working is the web browser panel. None of the apps can't get connection to server with signed cert.

Purecut · « **Reply #20 on:** January 04, 2023, 05:32:32 am »

It would be very good that JRemote2 will also be available for Android TV. The old JRiver will not handle the remote on Android TV correctly and many functions are missing like in the JRemote2. For example JRiver crashes when reading large directories. The manufacturer should ensure that the MC can also be controlled on this platform as many other free competitors do.

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Author Topic: NEW: ChromeCast on JRemote2 for Android (Read 11258 times)