iOS 7 SDK not abiding background audio

Question

I have done a lot of research, both on Google and StackOverflow. All the answers I found do not work in iOS 7. I started writing fresh app in iOS 7 SDK with Xcode 5.

All

Answer 1

I managed to solve this, and to save hair pulling by another poor soul here goes:

Firstly make sure your Info.plist correctly lists audio as a background mode.

(If you dont know what i'm talking about select YOURAPPNAME-Info.plist select that. Click oin the plus sign and add a new key called UIBackgroundModes and expand it. Add a value called audio.)

You'll need a reference to whatever playback object is creating the audio. Since I'm only playing audio and AVplayer was not abiding by the background audio, use this in your view controller's header:

@property (nonatomic, retain) MPMoviePlayerController *audioPlayer;

In the implementation, do the following:

 [super viewDidAppear:animated];

    //Once the view has loaded then we can register to begin recieving controls and we can become the first responder
    [[UIApplication sharedApplication] beginReceivingRemoteControlEvents];
    [self becomeFirstResponder];

and

- (void)viewWillDisappear:(BOOL)animated {
    [super viewWillDisappear:animated];

    //End recieving events
    [[UIApplication sharedApplication] endReceivingRemoteControlEvents];
    [self resignFirstResponder];

add two methods

//Make sure we can recieve remote control events
- (BOOL)canBecomeFirstResponder {
    return YES;
}

- (void) registerForAudioObjectNotifications {

    NSNotificationCenter *notificationCenter = [NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter];

    [notificationCenter addObserver: self
                           selector: @selector (handlePlaybackStateChanged:)
                               name: MixerHostAudioObjectPlaybackStateDidChangeNotification
                             object: audioObject];
}

now ALL important code - this enables your app to control audio from "control center" and from lock screen:

- (void) remoteControlReceivedWithEvent: (UIEvent *) receivedEvent {

    if (receivedEvent.type == UIEventTypeRemoteControl) {

        switch (receivedEvent.subtype) {

            case UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlTogglePlayPause:
                [self playOrStop: nil];
                break;

            default:
                break;
        }
    }
}

you can add many many types of Event types here and call any method.

Typical events are:

 UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlPlay                 = 100,  //Parent EVENT

// All below are sub events and you can catch them using switch or If /else.
    UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlPause                = 101,
    UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlStop                 = 102,
    UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlTogglePlayPause      = 103,
    UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlNextTrack            = 104,
    UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlPreviousTrack        = 105,
    UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlBeginSeekingBackward = 106,
    UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlEndSeekingBackward   = 107,
    UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlBeginSeekingForward  = 108,
    UIEventSubtypeRemoteControlEndSeekingForward    = 109,

To Debug help you can use:

 MPMoviePlayerController *mp1= (MPMoviePlayerController *)[notification object];
    NSLog(@"Movie State is: %d",[mp1 playbackState]);

    switch ([mp1 playbackState]) {
        case 0:
            NSLog(@"******* video has stopped");
            break;
        case 1:
            NSLog(@"******* video is playing after being paused or moved.");
                       break;
        case 2:
            NSLog(@"******* video is paused");
                break;
        case 3:
            NSLog(@"******* video was interrupted");
            break;
        case 4:
            NSLog(@"******* video is seeking forward");
                     break;
        case 5:
            NSLog(@"******* video is seeking Backwards");
            break;
        default:
            break;

and thats it - hope it helps some one out there! - this is working perfect on iOS 7 and iOS 6 with Storyboard app as well as control using Headphone and all new control centre too.