Hi Piru - OK thanks for the insight, which I suppose I suspected in any case, but nice that you have stated that in print.

That said, I just went on the Formula 1's website to watch a video from today's qualifications and it played from start to finish, with both video and audio, all in sync, admittedly at SD quality, but sadly after it completed playing the video Wayfarer crashed (Report sent) and that's on My MacMini 1.5GHz so it's obviously possible for Wayfarer to cope with such media, it just needs to be able to "survive" playing such media and continue working.

It may well be worth mentioning again that downloads from the Amiga Future website don't function as expected, as instead of them being saved with the names allocated by the website admin they get downloaded as "Load" - that's each and every single download which makes it very difficult to wade through each one - with the name "Load" but each with a suffix number - to find the one you specifically want from, let's say from a series of 30 downloads, that's unless you haven't closed Wayfarer and looked back at the downloads list, but it's quite annoying as this has still not been addressed as yet.

The day a file can be downloaded using a "Save As" scheme, so you can save it with a name of your own choosing and specific ad-hoc location on your system's storage media will also be a great day!

Another issue is with the PageStream site as some downloads work OK, and others don't get referred correctly, so you get the title name, but no data transferred or some other anomaly takes place and the download never occurs. This issue does not occur with OWB so there seems to be something in the download mechanism that is mishandling the request in Wayfarer.

I can send these in as bugs or requests, if required, just let me know if that's needed, but I feel sure I've mentioned at least most of these issues already, but I'm still waiting to know they've been fixed.

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YouTube's desktop UI is horribly bloated and dog slow nowadays, so G4 is suffering with it, but YouTube's mobile UI is very usable and I only use that nowadays, but if you get links like these that point to the desktop UI, then you have to change manually to m. urls.

Try the previous videos with these URLs instead:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Iv38R8l3EHU
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T2z54XSRo3w
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pqce-7x1e24

I usually enter to Youtube by a mobile url in my bookmarks and use it from there on then...

It seems that eBay are managing (partially) to "block" Wayfarer users/members of eBay from logging in by "limiting" the network or marking the network as "Rate limited or network error. Please retry" - with the "hcaptcha" mechanism thus disallowing Wayfarer, when used as a desktop browser (Chrome, Safari, Wayfarer) from being recognised as a currently reputable browser. The other remark on this "hcaptcha" page is "If you are having difficulties with rendering of images on the above verification page, eBay suggests using the latest version of your browser, or an alternate browser listed on the customer service page."

If I login using my Windows system then the "rating" is defeated as Windows browsers do not seem to get affected by this network limitation/rating, and so this mechanism can be replied to correctly and bypassed until the next time they trigger that mechanism for "hcaptcha" to implement their "Security measure" - which seems to be every time you change from certain aspects of an account to another, such as, from Summary to Purchase History or Messages, so it can be every few hours or even less. Once the hcaptcha has been responded to satisfactorily then I can use Wayfarer to login to my eBay pages, but not until that "hcaptcha" has been responded to correctly via my Windows system.

Originally/initially, when Wayfarer first came out the "picture blocks", the frame of about 9 images with chimneys, bridges, hills, cars, etc., was generated without problem, but now with this "Rate limited or network error. Please retry" comment above the initial activation block it never generates the "picture blocks" it just starts the concentric circle counter that initiates the "picture blocks" from. So, you cannot verify yourself with the security measure as it never offers the options that allow you to complete the security measure check.

It's probably only a matter of time before they find a way to "block" Wayfarer from using eBay's site altogether unless some verification directly to eBay &/or hcaptcha is made to have Wayfarer recognised with eBay/hcaptcha as a bonafide web browser that can be trusted/allowed to use their site.

I have been able to access my pages without having to complete the "hcaptcha" security measure, so far, using Wayfarer as Safari/IOS, but then the pages look generally like a mobile phone app rather than a desktop view.

There's no hcaptcha on ebay in Canada so there's little I can do, unless you can find a website that will always present one. Even then, it's unlikely I'd be able to do anything about it. What you could try is copy a user agent from your Windows box where this works. It's a long shot though.

Edit: I did try hcaptcha on some test page and it worked fine…

[ Edited by jacadcaps 06.07.2021 - 23:03 ]

I obviously don't know if the hCaptcha is some hybrid offering of ebay.co.uk/hCaptcha that's specific to the UK but it doesn't always offer this "security measure" on ebay.co.uk, it's just when you do something to move from one part of your account to another, and usually, for now, only if I use Wayfarer with a User Agent as Safari (not Safari/iOS), Chrome, or Wayfarer itself.

Even now, using Wayfarer v2.2 I cannot use the Safari/iOS User Agent in Wayfarer as even that option has popped up as the same issue with this Security Measure with hCaptcha, so I can now no longer access my eBay account.

[UPDATE] - I just loaded Wayfarer v1.21, as an afterthought/double-check, to find that the hCaptcha mechanism works as it should with that version 1.21 , so the picture boxes/squares are generated correctly and can be completed, so it seems that somewhere the v2.2 or a version earlier has broken the way in which the hCaptcha works, and needs fixing.

Now I come to think of it I also had an issue with a couple of other websites (can't remember which at the moment) but probably some site that had strengthened security, for similar security issues ("Rate limited or network error. Please retry") with hCaptcha with version 2.2, so it probably is related to Wayfarer v2.2 being compromised internally regarding hCaptcha, and maybe some other web security issue(s).

I've just tried to log into eBay.co.uk using Wayfarer 2.2 on my G5 and hCaptcha came up fine and I was able to get in.

I was spoofing as Chrome at the time.

When I get a chance I'll try the same on my MacMini.

@ Zetec-s - OK, I'm glad you've been able to login, but if you can get in with Wayfarer v2.2 then what is blocking me using v2.2, but allowng me to use v1.21 without any trouble?

Havng said that, I can sometimes login with v2.2, it's just when the hCaptcha - Security Measure gets activated that I cannot get past that part of logging in.

Additional to that problem I also come up against "You don't have permission to access "http://pay.ebay.co.uk/xo?" on this server. Reference #18.f63b3717.1625679647.12d9ebd0" when I try to pay for some items on eBay, and I end up paying when I've loaded v1.21 without any issues, so it's not just something simple it seems to me.

Could it be a cookie problem or something else within the settings, some sort of corruption of data that was transferred from an earlier version of Wayfarer?

Though having said that the settings I have for v2.2 were carried over, mainly, from v1.21, so that doesn't seem to indicate where the problem might be.

Your problems may be caused by a caching issue. Deleting the 'Cache' folder in your Wayfarer 2.2 installation path (when it's not running) could help.

Wayfarer 2.3 is now out!

- Reimplemented fullscreen support to display contents on a separate screen
- Implemented HLS stream A/V synchronization for streams that contain no timestamps
- MediaSource playback improvements, including workarounds for broken websites
- Implemented code to stall the video pipeline when audio stalls
- Fixed a crash in ffmpeg h264 decoder

Thx jacadcaps! It's awesome how often you're updating!

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When I install the latest version I always delete from the Cache the Curl and Storage contents.

However, I don't usually delete the ___IndexedDB or FavIcons or the cookie.jar.db . . .

So, if you think this might help I'll try that with your latest release of Wayfarer v2.3 - for which I am, as always very appreciative of all your hard work to keep updating and fixing this great program, when it becomes necessary, due to pests like me .

If the cookie.jar.db, or one of the other Cache components might be upsetting this "hCaptcha" process working as intended then I would obviously want to eliminate it, so I will try v2.3 with no saved cache contents and see how that functions, and report back here (unless I get a Crash Reporter in the meantime).

Thanks Jacadcaps.

Just installed v2.3 on my MacMini and really enjoying fullscreen youtube video even if I'm mainly using 360p.

Using version 2.3 without any transferred Cache seems to have resolved/fixed the hCaptcha "Rate limited or network error. Please retry".

So, maybe it was a cookie issue?

I don't know if this has fully resolved the issue, but I have had one hCaptcha Security Measure check - with the picture/image boxes/squares, whilst using eBay that I was able to complete with version 2.3 so probably it was something from within the Cache that had limited access to logging in/being verified as bona fide using Wayfarer, but it seems, at least for the moment, to be resolved.

If I get further issues then I'll obviously report the matter here, but if there was a cookie manager then I'd have been able to "flush" only the cookie for eBay and try just that, whereas I'd have to flush all the cookies otherwise/currently as this is not possible to access/manage the individual cookies from within Wayfarer.

Video with version 2.3 does seem to be more fluid, but on the Formula 1 website I still don't get any audio with the video.

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In April, you reported the following:
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Are you still running a web browser, which potentially needs to write thousands of files per session, from a removable FAT32-formatted USB device?

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Yes, and currently it's working very well, without any issues . . . do you have some concern regarding that?

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Yes. USB and FAT32 both represent major sources of failure points. (Plus, USB is an obvious performance bottleneck that can lead to all sorts of side effects.)

While the FAT32 file system works reasonably well for exchanging personal documents, no MorphOS user should be surprised to experience data loss or corruption after unusually large amounts of write operations.

This is even an issue on other mainstream operating systems. I have seen both Windows 10 and MacOS stumble when copying thousands of tiny files to FAT32 formatted USB storage devices.

True. ^^ exFAT all the way (where possible).

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We have exFAT on MorphOS, but this does not fix the USB issue.

You would not use a hard drive that stops spinning and restarts every now and then. Same happens to USB, it is just called a NAK timeout.

USB should be used for data transfer or installing purpose, but not for running heavy duty operations that constantly read and write megabytes of data.

The USB protocol (at least USB1 and USB2) is just bullshit and a result of keeping controller chips cheap. Unlike firewire, which is way faster on equal bus speeds, you need to do most stuff in software. The first iteration even required 32 bytes overhead to transfer 32 bytes of data.

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As others have pointed out, it's most likely a USB issue. My guess would be some http cached file got only partially written to drive due to crashing/rebooting/usb/whatever and you were being served half a JavaScript file instead of a full one, or something like this. I have this happen once in a while but I crash a lot when doing some of the tests so it's kind of expected.

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Loaded https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/video.race-highlights-2021-austrian-grand-prix.1704370404771962147.html just now on a 1.5GHz mini. Waited for page to load (until CPU goes down), then Settings menu > www.formula1.com >
- Media Playback: on
- Media Source Playback: on
- Require User Gesture: on (that's important)
- HLS Streaming: on
- VP9: off (you really don't want VP9 OFF a mini, it's way too slow)
- HVC: off (it's also way too slow on a mini)
- Decode video: on
- Spoofing: Wayfarer

If "Require User Gesture.." was off before, you might want to reload the page now. Once ready, press the big play button, wait for a bit, it's start loading and show you the preview picture again with the player bar accessible. Select SD quality, then press play. It's not gonna be great but it will play, with audio. The player on this website alternates streams mid-play (changes qualities as it sees fit), so you'll see some stalls. Nothing I can do about this, this is fully controlled via JavaScript.

If it's still too slow, put Wayfarer on a faster drive. Loading websites writes a LOT of data to a drive and using a slow medium like USB will negatively impact performance at a time when you already have no margin left, if only because USB I/O normally needs more CPU than regular HDD I/O.

If it's still too slow, tough luck.

I'll look into why there's no sound when spoofing as Safari/iOS when I have the time.

Edit: after a quick analysis of the HLS stream (the one you get with Safari/iOS), turns out this is a special case (oh joy) where the audio is a separate HLS sub-stream. No promises on whether this is ever going to be supported, as it's a lot of extra work for a single website.

[ Edited by jacadcaps 08.07.2021 - 15:56 ]

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I've not had a problem that I'm aware of with the USB2 connected SATA HDD - but obviously as/when I've had "crashes" with Wayfarer then maybe this affected a file/part of a file in the cache, but so far all has been great with v2.3 !

I don't intend to put Wayfarer on my main system HDD as yet, but I feel it's almost time to do so, and I take on board yours and others comments about using USB2 for such intensive small file(s) transfer/loading.
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Most of those settings were as commented above, but I had Spoofing/User Agent set as Safari - why select Wayfarer?

Also, that option for Require User Gesture was OFF - but why must "Require User Gesture: ON? As I don't see any User Gesture required as such before it starts to play the video, please explain why this is so important?

Frankly I would never have thought to have the Require User Gesture set to on, as I would never have thought that was important for audio to work, or for whatever it achieves. As I never realised there was any "gesture" I needed to take or action I took to make audio get triggered, even now when I do get audio playing on the Formula 1 videos - thanks to your great options/advice.

Just a query regarding other sites that have video that will require audio output - should all such sites, i.e. YouTube, have the Require User Gesture - set to ON (just in case that setting is as important as it is on Formula 1), and should the User Agent be set to Wayfarer, or any other settings that are necessary for such sites.

Ideally a better breakdown of what the menu/settings options do to trigger video/audio codecs on such webpages would probably help understand what is needed to be set on/off for a webpage by webpage basis.
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I find that even with the USB2 SATA HDD the data is spooled quickly enough, and the videos play through almost seamlessly, with audio - within the limitations I expected (SD video), but I'll bear in mind the advice about using Wayfarer from the system IDE channel in the future, but for now it's entirely acceptable - thanks.
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For me, as long as I know which options to choose to make it work then I'm happy with that, it was just the obvious disappointment of watching a video with no audio - that's now solved - which is great, so for me v2.3, along with your great advice/settings, is a good step forward.

Requiring a user gesture basically avoids player starting to play before the website is actually loaded. Things can easily go south with many JS players in that case, due to timings. Better to wait until the website loads, then start playback.

@ jacadcaps - but what is the Required User Gesture?

Though I see the v2.3 menu has now been amended to state "Requires User Gesture to Play" which explains it better, and I see the MUI help seems to have a better explanation - "Block auto play of media without user interaction"

Would "user action required to start to play media", maybe with "allows website to load all initial media data prior to user triggering playing" explain the meaning of the option button more simply? Though your explanation above makes understanding why the "gesture/action" should be implemented for certain sites, and is in effect probably a last resort to allow the full website media data that is being requested to be loaded - has to be delayed until the full initial loading has completed before a user takes specific action to start the media playing.

This was not clear at all, well not to me, to understand why the "Requires User Gesture ( to Play v2.3)" radio button was there from the initial release, and in what circumstances it should be considered or triggered as a last resort, but I understand its use now - following your explanation.

Unfortunately I do not get Wayfarer playing YT videos...:(
Yes, I have copied the cgxvideo.library to MOSSYS:Libs.
Example: https://www.morphos-storage.net/?id=1652577
I can see the start screen ("Broderbund Softare presents..."), if I then click play then the white circle starts turning but the background stays black...

My settings: Media playback enabled, spoofing as Chrome, enabled all types of codecs....
Any idea? In OWB it works...Thanks!

PS: By the way, it feels like that Wayfarer becomes slower. Even MorphOS Storage takes some seconds...

Your graphics card isn't supported for video playback. Radeon HD 5450 has no hardware overlay support. Please see https://morphos-team.net/hardware for a list of supported graphics cards.

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Is it the only tab that's opened?

Ohhhh, just a reason more to get another one...;) Thanks for the hint!

In this case I only had MorphOS Storage and moph.zone opened but maybe it is also due to the graphics card...?