iphone - Using MPMediaItems with AVAudioPlayer

Question

Is it possible to pick media items using MPMediaPickerController and then load them into an AVAudioPlayer object?

Answer 1

If MPMusicPlayerController doesn't meet your needs, you can copy the audio to your local bundle so you can use AVAudioPlayer.

EDIT

You basically have three options for playing audio from the user's iPod library: MPMediaPlayer, AVPlayer and AVAudioPlayer.

Here are examples for MPMediaPlayer and AVPlayer:

- (void) mediaPicker: (MPMediaPickerController *) mediaPicker
   didPickMediaItems: (MPMediaItemCollection *) collection {


    MPMediaItem *item = [[collection items] objectAtIndex:0];
    NSURL *url = [item valueForProperty:MPMediaItemPropertyAssetURL];

    [self dismissModalViewControllerAnimated: YES];

    // Play the item using MPMusicPlayer

    MPMusicPlayerController* appMusicPlayer = [MPMusicPlayerController applicationMusicPlayer];

    [appMusicPlayer setQueueWithItemCollection:collection];
    [appMusicPlayer play];


    // Play the item using AVPlayer

    AVPlayerItem *playerItem = [[AVPlayerItem alloc] initWithURL:url];
    AVPlayer *player = [[AVPlayer alloc] initWithPlayerItem:playerItem];
    [player play];  

}

If you need to use AVAudioPlayer for some reason, or you need access to the audio file's actual audio data, you have to first copy the audio file to your app's directory and then work with it there. The AVAsset + AVPlayer stuff is the closest analogy to ALAsset if you're used to working with photos and videos.