[Shaka 4.16] HLS VOD playback fails at Ad Break

[will.harris]

Before you continue

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Before submitting a bug report, please review our troubleshooting documentation at Troubleshoot Issues | Vega Troubleshooting

If you still want to file a bug report, please make sure to fill in all the details below and provide the necessary information.

NOTE: PLEASE ONLY REPORT A SINGLE BUG USING THIS TEMPLATE.
If you’re experiencing multiple issues, please file a separate report for each.

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Bug Description

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1. Summary

During playback of a SSAI HLS VOD stream with Shaka 4.16.13, playback fails at the transition from content to ads with an `UNKNOWN` streaming error. Immediately afterward the ShakaPlayer recovery path attempts to create fresh `MediaSource` instances and re-add source buffers, and every `addSourceBuffer()` call is rejected by the native W3C MSE implementation (`AddSourceBuffer: ERROR` → `Unable to add Source Buffer!!!`), so playback cannot resume.

App Name:
App Link on Amazon Appstore (found through Developer Console → Actions column in App List → View on Amazon.com): Discovered on Pluto Dev App, reproducible with Amazon Reference Video App.

Bug Severity
Select one that applies

• Impacts operation of app
• Blocks current development
• Improvement suggestion
• Issue with documentation (If selected, please share the doc link and describe the issue)
• Other

2. Steps to Reproduce

1. Load HLS VOD SSAI stream.
2. Seek to ~10s before first ad break
3. Wait for ad break to start
4. Observe failed playback and error

3. Observed Behavior

Explain what actually happened, noting any discrepancies or malfunctions.

Playback fails with Streaming Error "UNKNOWN"

[VideoHandler.ts] - Streaming Error:
Category: UNKNOWN
Format: HLS
Position: 976.579
DRM Blocked: false
Has DRM Keys: false

4. Expected Behavior

Describe what you expected the SDK to do under normal operation.

Playback to transition to ad break without error.

4.a Possible Root Cause & Temporary Workaround

Fill out anything you have tried. If you don’t know, N/A is acceptable

n/a

5. Logs or crash report

(Please make sure to provide relevant logs as attachment)

failure-excerpt.txt (1.1 MB)

Will send full logs to Amazon contact.

For crash issues, please refer this guide for faster troubleshooting: Detect Where the App Crash Originates | Design and Develop Vega Apps

• App/Device Logs

• Crash Logs

• Crash Report

• For issues with Vega Studio Extension, please share log files from below folders:
  For v0.22+:

  ~/.vscode/extensions/amazon.vega-extension-<version>/ExtensionLogs
  ~/.vscode/extensions/amazon.vega-ui-extension-<version>/ExtensionLogs
  

  For v0.21 and earlier:

   ~/.vscode/extensions/amazon.kepler-extension-<version>/ExtensionLogs
   ~/.vscode/extensions/amazon.kepler-ui-extension-<version>/ExtensionLogs
  

6. Environment

Please fill out the fields related to your bug below:

• SDK Version: 0.22.6150

• App State: [Foreground]

• OS Information: Please ssh into the device via vega exec vda shell (or kepler exec vda shell for v0.21 and earlier) and copy the output from cat /etc/os-release into the answer section below. Note, if you don’t have a simulator running or device attached, the command will respond with vda: no devices/emulators found

  NAME="OS"
  OE_VERSION="4.0.0"
  OS_MAJOR_VERSION="1"
  OS_MINOR_VERSION="1"
  RELEASE_ID="21"
  OS_VERSION="1.1"
  BRANCH_CODE="TV Ship"
  BUILD_DESC="OS 1.1 (TV Ship/27)"
  BUILD_FINGERPRINT="4.0.344088.0(3072cab629675a74)/27N:user/release-keys"
  BUILD_VARIANT="user"
  BUILD_TAGS="release-keys"
  BUILD_DATE="Thu Jun 18 06:50:08 UTC 2026"
  BUILD_TIMESTAMP="1781765408"
  VERSION_NUMBER="2101010002720"
  

7. Example Code Snippet / Screenshots / Screengrabs

Include any relevant code or component setup in React Native that can help reproduce the bug.

import { ExampleComponent } from 'custom-sdk';

<ExampleComponent config={{ key: 'value' }} />

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Playback Issues

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If this is a playback issue, please provide your content URL, any pre-conditions (like geo-location), and let us know if it’s x86 or arm7.

Will provide content to Amazon contact.

Please share the following details in addition:_

• Player SDK: [Shaka]
• Player SDK Version: [4.16.13]
  • Audio Codecs: [AAC]
  • Video Codecs: [h.264]
  • Manifest Types: [m3u8]

Q: If applicable, please provide your media/content url
If this is created dynamically, tokenized, etc please provide a way for us to access it

Will provide to Amazon contact.

Q: Are there any special headers required to reproduce the issue you are facing?

No

Additionally please provide the following if possible
Provide Screenshots / Screengrabs / Logs. Please include as much information as you can that will help debug.

<!-- Answer here if applicable --> 

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Additional Context

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Any Additional Context you would like to provide?
Add any other relevant information, such as recent updates to the SDK, dependencies, or device OS that may affect the bug.

<!-- Answer here if applicable  --> 

[amen]

Hi @will.harris,

Thank you for the detailed bug report on the HLS VOD playback failure at ad breaks with Shaka 4.16.

Our team is investigating this issue and will provide an update as soon as we have more information.

Thanks for helping us improve the Vega platform.

Warm regards,
Aishwarya