[BUG] - No playback (failed to create cache dir?)

[Ashymad]

Describe the bug

Hi, I am not sure what causes the issue, but on my device the playback just doesn't work. Pressing play on an album adds the tracks to the playlists and attempts to play the first one, but nothing happens and after a short while the icon from the pause button switches to play button again.

I have tested other subsonic clients and they seem to work normally.

Expected behavior

Playback

To Reproduce

I assume this only happens on specific setups, because I installed the app, connected it to the server and played an album, no settings modified.

Environment

• Android device: Xiaomi Poco X3 Pro
• Android OS version: Android 16 (crDroid with microG)
• App version: 4.12.6
• App variant: Degoogled, from IzzyOnDroid
• Other relevant details: I am using Navidrome for the server, behind a reverse proxy

Logs or Screenshots

2026-03-11-10-44-45.txt

All I could find in the logs is the cache directory error. I tried disabling the cache in the settings, but that didn't do anything.

Additional context

[tvillega]

Does your device have an external storage (microSD card)?

This path:

/storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus/files/streaming_cache

seems to be interpreted by Android as external storage [1].

Since you are using the highest available Android version with a custom ROM, it is possible that the app got installed in such a way that it requieres access to external storage even if there is not one attached.

Check if giving that permission allows the creation of the cache folder.

[1] https://www.programmersought.com/article/264510331/

[Ashymad]

The article you linked is very old, it mentions Android 6 and 4. With the current versions (14+) of android both internal and external storage app-specific directories are accesible to applications by default. There is still a permission that can be requested to manage the rest of the storage, but I can't give it to the app, since it has to be included in the manifest file and requested on runtime.

In the meantime I tried creating the cache directory myself, but even with the directory in place I still get the same error and behaviour. Oh and no, I don't have an SD card.

Let me know if I can try something else or get more logs somehow.

[tvillega]

You are correct, the article is really old. The reason I linked it is because Tempus has a minSdkVersion of 24 (Android 7.0 'Nougat'), therefore the app could be doing those assumptions on the directories its methods are returning.

Poking through the code lead me to this method:

tempus/app/src/main/java/com/cappielloantonio/tempo/util/DownloadUtil.java

Lines 190 to 209 in 7a17e91

	private static synchronized File getStreamingCacheDirectory(Context context) {
	if (streamingCacheDirectory == null) {
	if (Preferences.getStreamingCacheStoragePreference() == 0) {
	streamingCacheDirectory = context.getExternalFilesDirs(null)[0];
	if (streamingCacheDirectory == null) {
	streamingCacheDirectory = context.getFilesDir();
	}
	} else {
	try {
	streamingCacheDirectory = context.getExternalFilesDirs(null)[1];
	} catch (Exception exception) {
	streamingCacheDirectory = context.getExternalFilesDirs(null)[0];
	Preferences.setStreamingCacheStoragePreference(0);
	}
	}
	}
	return streamingCacheDirectory;
	}

There we have two calls:

• getExternalFilesDirs(null), which is requesting the app-specific root (indexed, because it is an array).
• getFilesDir() which docstring states Returns the absolute path to the directory on the filesystem

Following the current Android documentation about storage [1], Tempus seems to always request the external storage first and then falling back to the app-specific root. I will open a PR (with the respective debug apk attached) that prints to logcat what is going on there, because the app assumes that all the returned directories exist and I suspect that your system is returning all directories that could exist.

In the meantime I tried creating the cache directory myself, but even with the directory in place I still get the same error and behaviour. Oh and no, I don't have an SD card.

Okay, we can rule out permission issues on external storage. I don't know how to manipulate the Android filesystem by hand, mainly because there are too many possible combinations of paths and permissions. However, here there is an screenshot of my device storage of the debug apk:

It lives under /data/data, whereas your logcat shows that the app tried to write under /storage/emulated/0/Android/data.

---

Just for the sake of completeness, the storage layout of my phone is the following:

/
\_ sdcard -> (link) /storage/self/primary 
\_ storage
    \_ emulated (access denied)
    \_ sdcard0 -> (link) /sdcard0
    \_ self
        \_ primary -> (link) /storage/emulated/0

If you have access to those directories, we could have a better understanding on how Tempus is saving files in your phone.

[1] https://developer.android.com/training/data-storage/

[eddyizm]

Hi @Ashymad
Did you happen to try the other variant to see if you get the same result?

[tvillega]

Debug APK for degoogled.

The logic is the following:

    private static synchronized File getStreamingCacheDirectory(Context context) {
        streamingCacheDirectories = context.getExternalFilesDirs(null);
        Log.d("CacheDir", Arrays.toString(streamingCacheDirectories)); // Print all the returned cache directories
        if (streamingCacheDirectory == null) {
            if (Preferences.getStreamingCacheStoragePreference() == 0) {
                streamingCacheDirectory = streamingCacheDirectories[0];
                if (streamingCacheDirectory == null) {
                    streamingCacheDirectory = context.getFilesDir();
                    Log.d("CacheDir", String.valueOf(streamingCacheDirectory)); // Print worst case of everything being null
                }
            } else {
                try {
                    streamingCacheDirectory = streamingCacheDirectories[1];
                } catch (Exception exception) {
                    streamingCacheDirectory = streamingCacheDirectories[0];
                    Preferences.setStreamingCacheStoragePreference(0);
                }

            }
        }

        Log.d("CacheDir", String.valueOf(streamingCacheDirectory)); // Print what is being used
        return streamingCacheDirectory;
    }

In my case, the output is:

---------------------------- PROCESS STARTED (24969) for package com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug ----------------------------
2026-03-22 19:43:39.321 24969-24969 CacheDir                com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug   D  [/storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug/files]
2026-03-22 19:43:39.321 24969-24969 CacheDir                com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug   D  /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug/files

[Ashymad]

I've reproduced the error with the debug APK.
The dirs are the same on my device but it fails to create them. Maybe this is an issue in the upstream androidx/media library?

03-23 16:04:34.133 13890 13890 D CacheDir: [/storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug/files]
03-23 16:04:34.133 13890 13890 D CacheDir: /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug/files

Full Log

[eddyizm]

Hi @Ashymad
It does seem like something is wrong with the permissions:

03-23 16:04:34.129 13890 13890 W ContextImpl: Failed to ensure /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug/files
03-23 16:04:34.129 13890 13890 W ContextImpl: java.lang.IllegalStateException: Failed to prepare /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug/files
# later on
03-23 16:04:34.133 13890 13890 D CacheDir: /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug/files
03-23 16:04:34.135 13890 15155 E SimpleCache: Failed to create cache directory: /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug/files/streaming_cache
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal: Playback error
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal:   androidx.media3.exoplayer.ExoPlaybackException: Source error
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal:       at androidx.media3.exoplayer.ExoPlayerImplInternal.handleIoException(ExoPlayerImplInternal.java:927)
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal:       at androidx.media3.exoplayer.ExoPlayerImplInternal.handleMessage(ExoPlayerImplInternal.java:903)
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal:       at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:128)
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal:       at android.os.Looper.dispatchMessage(Looper.java:333)
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal:       at android.os.Looper.loopOnce(Looper.java:263)
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal:       at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:367)
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal:       at android.os.HandlerThread.run(HandlerThread.java:139)
03-23 16:04:37.192 13890 15065 E ExoPlayerImplInternal:   Caused by: androidx.media3.datasource.cache.Cache$CacheException: Failed to create cache directory: /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.eddyizm.degoogled.tempus.debug/files/streaming_cache

Can you tell us what your settings are? Besides a reinstall, I'd like to know if there is any chance of disabling the cache, to see if that changes anything would be worth a try. The simple cache also caches with album covers so we could try to disable that so it doesn't try to write to disk.

[Ashymad]

@eddyizm I have all default settings. The only thing i have set up is the connection to navidrome and no settings changed.

In the meantime I was able to get it to work. Just disabling the cache, setting it to 0MB does make it work, although it seems, it's not immediately that it works. I had to attempt to play multiple albums before it started to work and then it just worked for every album. It also seems that after an update the same thing happens with me unable to play for a few tries until it works. In between updates though it works perfectly. If i enable the cache back again it stops working, as expected. I couldn't find a way to disable artwork cache though, but it seems it wasn't necessary.

I am so glad I was able to make it work though because Tempus is miles better than other open source subsonic clients for android.

I wonder what makes the cache for audio specifically not work though if like you say simple cache is also used for artwork and that seems to not cause any problems for me.