Playback auth regression QA

Evidence status: This page preserves a dated QA packet. Treat rows marked blocked, pending hardware QA, or release-readiness follow-up as stale evidence until they are rerun on current devices and builds.

Run date: 2026-06-15 from /home/lowband/dev/workspaces/ferrex/LOW-415.

This packet records the playback-auth regression gate for the Ferrex server, desktop GStreamer path, desktop MPV hand-off, Android mobile, and Android TV. It focuses on short-lived playback tickets, fail-closed stream access, log redaction, and expiry/retry recovery evidence.

Current disposition

Area	Disposition	Evidence / gap
Rust format/check/core	Pass	`cargo fmt`, workspace `cargo check --all-targets`, and `ferrex-core` lib tests passed. Workspace check still emits existing `ferrexctl` missing-doc warnings.
Server playback auth integration	Pass	`crates/ferrex-server/tests/playback_stream_failures.rs` passed against a local Nix Postgres with `pg_uuidv7`: ticket issue, range streaming, missing/invalid token rejection, account API scope rejection, and typed media recovery headers.
Desktop GStreamer smoke	Pass	`scripts/qa/playback-auth-smoke.sh` served a local protected WAV fixture, verified bad tickets return 401, then completed `gst-launch-1.0 playbin` with fakesinks using the ticketed URL.
Desktop MPV smoke	Pass	The same smoke completed `mpv --no-config --ao=null` against the ticketed URL, redacted the MPV log, and verified retained artifacts do not contain the raw ticket.
Desktop ticket URL / redaction unit coverage	Pass	`ferrex-player-playback` tests passed for ticketed URL resolution, fail-closed ticket errors, and access-token redaction in playback/MPV log lines.
Android mobile / TV auth-expiry retry unit coverage	Pass	Focused Gradle unit command for `PlaybackFoundationTest.ticketAuthFailuresRetryThenInvalidateSession` returned `BUILD SUCCESSFUL` for mobile and TV tasks.
Android mobile / TV manual playback	Blocked	`adb devices -l` returned no attached devices. The SDK emulator binary cannot start in this NixOS workspace because of the stub-ld dynamic-loader error. Physical phone/TV or a runnable emulator is still required for manual playback evidence.
Android full assemble/unit/lint	Not rerun for LOW-415	No Android source code changed in this packet. The most recent full Android evidence is recorded in Android / Android TV final QA acceptance packet; rerun the full Gradle gate if Android code changes.

Exact validation commands and results

Repository baseline

cargo fmt --all --check

Result: pass; command exited successfully with no output.

nix develop .#ferrex-player --command env cargo check --workspace --all-targets

Result: pass; finished dev profile in 23.61s. Existing ferrexctl missing-documentation warnings were emitted; no errors.

nix develop .#ferrex-player --command env cargo test -p ferrex-core --lib

Result: pass; 170 passed; 0 failed; 0 ignored; 0 measured; 0 filtered out; finished in 4.89s.

Server playback auth integration

sqlx::test requires a live PostgreSQL with pg_uuidv7. This run used the Postgres binary supplied by the Nix dev shell and trust auth on loopback:

nix develop .#ferrex-player --command bash -lc '
set -euo pipefail
pg_dir="$(mktemp -d -t ferrex-low415-pg.XXXXXX)"
cleanup() {
  if [ -n "${PG_STARTED:-}" ]; then pg_ctl -D "$pg_dir/data" -m fast -w stop >/dev/null 2>&1 || true; fi
  rm -rf "$pg_dir"
}
trap cleanup EXIT
initdb -A trust -U postgres -D "$pg_dir/data" >/dev/null
pg_ctl -D "$pg_dir/data" -o "-F -p 55415 -k $pg_dir" -w start >/dev/null
PG_STARTED=1
DATABASE_URL="postgres://[email protected]:55415/postgres" cargo test -p ferrex-server --test playback_stream_failures
'

Result: pass; 4 passed; 0 failed; 0 ignored; 0 measured; 0 filtered out; finished in 2.76s.

Covered server scenarios:

Authenticated ticket issue for an available media file.
Full and byte-range streaming with a playback ticket.
Missing, invalid query-token, and invalid bearer-token stream access rejects without serving media bytes or stream headers.
Playback-scope tickets are rejected by account/admin APIs and are not reflected in response bodies or headers.
Missing media, unavailable media, and missing files return typed recovery headers.

Desktop playback auth smoke

The smoke script is intentionally local and self-contained: it generates a short WAV fixture, starts a loopback HTTP server that serves the fixture only when access_token matches a disposable ticket, verifies bad-ticket 401 behavior, then exercises the desktop GStreamer and MPV playback dependencies with headless/null sinks.

nix develop .#ferrex-player --command shellcheck scripts/qa/playback-auth-smoke.sh

Result: pass; no shellcheck findings.

nix develop .#ferrex-player --command bash scripts/qa/playback-auth-smoke.sh

Result: pass:

Playback auth smoke passed
 - unauthorized ticket rejected with HTTP 401
 - ticketed bytes fetched and matched fixture
 - GStreamer playbin completed with fakesinks
 - MPV completed with --no-config --ao=null
 - retained logs are redacted

To retain redacted smoke artifacts for a reviewer-requested packet:

FERREX_QA_KEEP_ARTIFACTS=1 nix develop .#ferrex-player --command bash scripts/qa/playback-auth-smoke.sh

Do not attach mpv.raw.log; the script deletes it after producing mpv.redacted.log.

Desktop ticket URL and redaction units

nix develop .#ferrex-player --command env cargo test -p ferrex-player-playback resolve_playback_stream_url

Result: pass; 2 passed; 0 failed; 4 filtered out.

nix develop .#ferrex-player --command env cargo test -p ferrex-player-playback redacts_access_token

Result: pass; 2 passed; 0 failed; 4 filtered out.

Android mobile / Android TV focused auth-expiry unit check

No Android source code changed in LOW-415, so the full assemble/unit/lint gate was not rerun. A focused playback auth-expiry check was rerun for mobile and TV unit tasks:

cd mobile/android && \
ANDROID_HOME=/home/lowband/Android/Sdk \
ANDROID_SDK_ROOT=/home/lowband/Android/Sdk \
./gradlew :app:testMobileDebugUnitTest :app:testTvDebugUnitTest \
  --tests 'com.ferrex.android.core.playback.PlaybackFoundationTest.ticketAuthFailuresRetryThenInvalidateSession' \
  --no-daemon --stacktrace \
  -Pandroid.aapt2FromMavenOverride=/home/lowband/Android/Sdk/build-tools/35.0.0/aapt2

Result: pass; BUILD SUCCESSFUL in 8s. Mobile reused cached test output that includes the full PlaybackFoundationTest class with 18 tests, 0 failures, 0 errors, 0 skipped; TV produced focused output with 1 test, 0 failures, 0 errors, 0 skipped for ticketAuthFailuresRetryThenInvalidateSession.

Android device / emulator availability

adb devices -l
/home/lowband/Android/Sdk/emulator/emulator -list-avds

Results:

adb devices -l: only the List of devices attached header; no phone, Android TV, or emulator target was attached.
Emulator listing failed before AVD enumeration: NixOS stub-ld dynamic executable error for /home/lowband/Android/Sdk/emulator/emulator.

Regression scenario matrix

Scenario	Server	Desktop GStreamer	Desktop MPV	Android mobile	Android TV
Ticket acquisition / ticketed stream	Pass: integration test issues a playback ticket and streams media bytes.	Pass: local ticketed URL plays through `gst-launch-1.0 playbin`.	Pass: local ticketed URL plays through MPV with null audio output.	Unit evidence: `fetchTicketUsesAuthenticatedTicketRouteAndBuildsTicketedStreamUrl`; manual blocked.	Same shared unit evidence; manual blocked.
Missing / invalid ticket	Pass: missing and invalid tokens return 401 without media bytes or streaming headers.	Pass: smoke verifies bad ticket returns HTTP 401 before playback.	Pass: smoke verifies bad ticket returns HTTP 401 before playback.	Unit evidence covers ticket auth failures and recovery copy; manual blocked.	Same shared unit evidence; manual blocked.
Ticket scope separation	Pass: playback ticket is forbidden on account/admin APIs and unauthorized as an account query token.	Not applicable; desktop clients consume stream URLs only.	Not applicable; desktop clients consume stream URLs only.	Covered by server contract plus mobile ticket transport route tests.	Covered by server contract plus shared ticket transport route tests.
Expiry / retry recovery	Server evidence: tickets have bounded positive expiry and invalid tokens fail closed.	Desktop unit evidence: ticket endpoint errors fail closed instead of returning a bare stream URL; live short-TTL retry was not manually exercised.	MPV log redaction passed; live short-TTL retry was not manually exercised.	Pass: `ticketAuthFailuresRetryThenInvalidateSession` rerun; broader `PlaybackFoundationTest` covers stream auth retry with fresh tickets. Manual playback blocked.	Pass: focused TV unit rerun for ticket auth retry/invalidation. Manual playback blocked.
Log / diagnostics redaction	Integration tests assert raw tokens are not echoed in auth failure responses.	Smoke retains only redacted logs; `redacts_access_token` unit tests pass.	Smoke redacts MPV log lines and verifies retained artifacts do not contain the disposable ticket.	Unit diagnostics redaction coverage exists in the Android QA packet; focused retry command did not produce device logs.	Same shared unit/QA-packet evidence; no device logs.
Hardware/emulator playback	Not applicable.	Headless dependency smoke passed; full interactive desktop UI playback was not captured.	Headless dependency smoke passed; full interactive desktop UI/MPV hand-off was not captured.	Blocked: no attached phone/emulator.	Blocked: no attached TV/emulator.

Required manual follow-up when hardware is available

Record device model, OS/API level, display mode, server build, media fixture, and redacted logs/screenshots for each manual run.

Desktop UI, GStreamer path: launch the player against a QA server, start playback from a detail page, verify the resolved stream URL is ticketed, pause/seek/exit, and confirm no raw ticket appears in Ferrex logs.
Desktop UI, MPV hand-off: use the same media item, launch “Play in MPV”, confirm MPV opens the ticketed stream, close MPV, and confirm Ferrex/MPV retained logs are redacted.
Short ticket expiry: configure a short playback-ticket TTL or use an expired ticket fixture. Verify server returns 401/403, clients retry where supported, and recovery remains actionable after retry limits without clearing app data.
Android phone: install app-mobile-debug.apk, sign in, play/resume/start-over, force ticket/session expiry, and verify retry then sign-in/change-server recovery without OS app-data wipe.
Android TV: install app-tv-debug.apk, repeat the phone playback/expiry cases using D-pad/OK/Back, and verify focus remains reachable on playback recovery actions.
Evidence redaction: before attaching logs, screenshots, videos, bugreports, or diagnostics exports, remove server URLs if sensitive, auth headers, bearer/session/refresh/access tokens, playback ticket URLs/query values, local device IDs, usernames when sensitive, PIN/setup material, and private paths.

Files added by this packet

scripts/qa/playback-auth-smoke.sh — reusable headless local ticketed-stream smoke for desktop GStreamer and MPV dependencies.
Playback auth regression QA — this cross-platform QA evidence packet.

Source evidence consulted

crates/ferrex-server/tests/playback_stream_failures.rs
crates/ferrex-player-playback/src/update.rs
crates/ferrex-player-playback/src/diagnostics.rs
mobile/android/app/src/test/kotlin/com/ferrex/android/core/playback/PlaybackFoundationTest.kt
Android / Android TV final QA acceptance packet
Android playback QA matrix
Android TV 10-foot QA matrix