[FIXED] Play a video using JavaFX on Raspberry Pi

Issue

I need to run a JavaFX project on Raspberry Pi (RASPBIAN JESSIE). The project includes usage of WebView and MediaView/MediaPlayer. Since Oracle does not support JavaFX on ARM platforms, I tried JavaFX port by Gluon (JavaFX Embedded SDK 8.60.8). WebView works almost perfectly. However, when I want to play a video using MediaPlayer/MediaView, I get the exception:

Error in GstPipelineFactory: can't find element for factory named qtdemux
Exception in Application start method
java.lang.reflect.InvocationTargetException
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:62)
    at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
    at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:497)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.launchApplicationWithArgs(LauncherImpl.java:389)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.launchApplication(LauncherImpl.java:328)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
    at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:62)
    at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
    at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:497)
    at sun.launcher.LauncherHelper$FXHelper.main(LauncherHelper.java:767)
Caused by: java.lang.RuntimeException: Exception in Application start method
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.launchApplication1(LauncherImpl.java:917)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.lambda$launchApplication$156(LauncherImpl.java:182)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:745)
Caused by: MediaException: UNKNOWN : com.sun.media.jfxmedia.MediaException: Could not create player! : com.sun.media.jfxmedia.MediaException: Could not create player!
    at javafx.scene.media.MediaException.exceptionToMediaException(MediaException.java:146)
    at javafx.scene.media.MediaPlayer.init(MediaPlayer.java:511)
    at javafx.scene.media.MediaPlayer.<init>(MediaPlayer.java:414)
    at zirro.App.start(App.java:21)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.LauncherImpl.lambda$launchApplication1$163(LauncherImpl.java:863)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.PlatformImpl.lambda$runAndWait$176(PlatformImpl.java:326)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.PlatformImpl.lambda$null$174(PlatformImpl.java:295)
    at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
    at com.sun.javafx.application.PlatformImpl.lambda$runLater$175(PlatformImpl.java:294)
    at com.sun.glass.ui.monocle.RunnableProcessor.runLoop(RunnableProcessor.java:92)
    at com.sun.glass.ui.monocle.RunnableProcessor.run(RunnableProcessor.java:51)
    ... 1 more
Caused by: com.sun.media.jfxmedia.MediaException: Could not create player!
    at com.sun.media.jfxmediaimpl.NativeMediaManager.getPlayer(NativeMediaManager.java:224)
    at com.sun.media.jfxmedia.MediaManager.getPlayer(MediaManager.java:104)
    at javafx.scene.media.MediaPlayer.init(MediaPlayer.java:467)
    ... 10 more

Any ideas how to successfully run a JavaFX application with WebView and MediaView/MediaPlayer on Raspberry Pi?

Solution

WebView and Media were never part of the JavaFX ARM distribution, but Gluon recently added it to the embedded SDK that can be downloaded from here and installed with a recent JDK for ARM, available here.

Media requires a few extra steps as it depends in the native drivers that usually are not fully installed on a regular Jessie distribution.

First install these drivers:

sudo apt-get install gstreamer0.10-plugins-good
sudo apt-get install gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad 

Now edit /etc/apt/sources.list and add at the end:

deb http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ wheezy main
deb-src http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ wheezy main

Save the file (Ctrl+O, Ctrl+X).

Finally update and install the drivers:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg
sudo apt-get install gstreamer0.10-alsa

Now you can try to run again your JavaFX application.

If you find again the same exception (MediaException: UNKNOWN), check if it shows this message: Error in GstPipelineFactory, notice the driver that is missing, and try to install it.

Answered By - José Pereda