IMA ads can be skipped by going fullscreen on chrome

[Jeroen Veltmans]

When our player is configured to play ads with IMA, it is able to play them like normal. Once I try to go fullscreen on an iPad / iPhone in chrome it goes back to the main content. This is thus actively able to skip the ad. We pass our video element when creating the ImaAdPlayer but it still creates a separate video element to play it with. So if we go native fullscreen it only selects one on chrome, the one where we have our main content. On Safari this works fine.

A minimal reproduction scenario can be found on a video.js test page which your getting started guide links to: https://googleads.github.io/videojs-ima/examples/advanced/

Steps to reproduce

1. Open https://googleads.github.io/videojs-ima/examples/advanced/
2. Click on sample to get a sample ad and press play
3. Play till an ad occurs, normally a preroll would happen
4. Go fullscreen
5. Notice how the main content is visible and not the ad

ResultsExpected

The ad should be fullscreen

Actual

The main content is fullscreen and the ad on the background

Additional Information

A previous similar issue was reported and was fixed in January: https://groups.google.com/g/ima-sdk/c/Iq6oBCZ8sA0?pli=1
It seemed to be iPhone in general so we believe this issue on chrome might be a different bug.

OSes

iPad version 14.0.1

[IMA SDK]

Hi Jeroen,

Thank you for reaching out to us with your concern. I was able to test all the links that you gave us as well as following the steps that you mentioned. I was able to get the preroll and a midroll. But I was always able to get the ad to show. I never had any issue where the content showed instead. if there is something else that needs to be done please let us know.

Regards,

William Pescherine IMA SDK Team

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[Jeroen Veltmans]

Thanks for the reply.

We have noticed this issue on multiple iPad/iPhone devices with the Chrome or Firefox browser. On other devices this works fine indeed. 

The issue is also not necessarily getting the ad to show, but that going fullscreen will not select the ad but the main content. So the ad would play, we go fullscreen and see that the content goes fullscreen and becomes able to be controlled. Pressing play will stop the ad and play the main content. 

Going fullscreen with the ad active will thus show the main content, but exitting fullscreen will then again show the ad. The issue is thus if we would remain fullscreen that the ad is skipped.

We think the issue might be that the ad is played in a new video element even though we have passed the same video element that the main content is playing in.

Is it possible to verify again that this scenario also occurs on your end? If not could you share the device you have tested on?

Regards,

Jeroen

[IMA SDK]

Hi Jeroen,

 

I'm Michael and I work along with William.

 

I have tested the issue on iPhone 8 Plus iOS 14.4 and couldn't replicate the same behavior (see attached file). Would you be able to share a screen recording of the behavior on your end? And please specify the device you are using for testing. Upon submitting the requested information, I will raise this to the rest of the team for further investigation.

Regards,

Michael Angelo Legaspi IMA SDK Team

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[Jeroen Veltmans]

Hi Michael,

In the attachment I have added the behavior on my end. I'm using an iPad Air 2 iPadOS 14.0.1

Regards,

Jeroen

[Fincons DEV]

Hi Michael,

We have been waiting for an answer to this topic since October 2021. 

Any updates about this issue?

Kind regards,

Dario

[Fincons DEV]

Hi Michael and William,

Jeroen on October 2021 has provided you with the ones you asked us to do an analysis. Please see the reply above.

It would be time for you to give us an answer and explains why we have this behavior.

Kind regards,

Dario

[IMA SDK]

Hi Dario,

My apologies for the extreme delay. It appears this case was misrouted in escalation and fell through the cracks of our system. I have tested this on an ipad air 2 as well as a few other devices in our test lab, such as an iPhone SE2 and iPad Pro, and have been able to reproduce the issue in the Chrome and Firefox browsers.

I have filed a bug against this issue, and our engineering team is looking into a workaround, however I need to clarify that on the iOS platform, the IMA SDK only offers official support for the Safari browser. This is because Apple heavily limits the functionality of third-party browsers on their devices. As such, our Eng team will work to mitigate the effects of the bug, but the user experience may not be identical to that seen in Safari.

Thanks,

Greg Schoppe