Friday 4 August 2017

YouTube on Blackberry PlayBook... Again


The PlayBook is five years old, and is really showing its age. The built-in YouTube app stopped working years ago, and now the Android version I got you to install before has started giving a warning that it'll stop working soon if you don't upgrade. Fortunately, you can, although it's a little convoluted.

First, grab yourself the BlackBerry Graphical Aid while you still can. Next, get the YouTube version 2.5.16 apk and convert it to a bar over at GoodEReader. Put your PlayBook in developer mode, then attach it to your computer via USB cable, and use the graphical aid to install the bar. Open the app, let it run, then close it. Easy enough.

Here's where it gets a bit odd. You need to install version 5.0.21 on top of version 2.5.16. Convert the apk and install it just like you did with the older version. You'll notice that it uses a green Android icon instead of the standard YouTube icon. You'll also notice that when you try to run the app, it just shows a black screen. I have no idea how the installation process works, but the original app gets overwritten, so once you close the black screen, you can tap the icon for version 2.5.16, and it'll open up with the new version. You can't delete the green Android icon version, but you can move the icon somewhere out of the way so it won't bother you. That's all there is to it. Hopefully this version won't be deprecated any time soon. You won't be able to sign in, so you can't upload videos, but you can still do that through the browser, if you really must.

Note: Version 5.0.21 is the latest version I could find that worked well. 5.1.10 can be installed in the same fashion, but it shows an error when trying to list the current trending videos. Everything else seems to work just as well, though. Additionally, version 5.5.30 can be installed and run from its own icon, however the search function doesn't work, making the app considerably less useful.