Video sharing via UIActivityController

Question

I am trying to transfer a PHAsset video through a UIActivityController using requestAVAsset. This works with Messaging, but not with AirDrop indicating "Failed."

PHCachingImageManager.default().requestAVAsset(forVideo: asset, options: nil, resultHandler: { (givenAsset, audioMix, info) in let videoAsset = givenAsset as! AVURLAsset let videoURL = videoAsset.url DispatchQueue.main.async { let activityViewController = UIActivityViewController( activityItems: [videoURL], applicationActivities: nil) activityViewController.excludedActivityTypes = [UIActivityType.saveToCameraRoll] if let popoverPresentationController = activityViewController.popoverPresentationController { popoverPresentationController.barButtonItem = (sender) } self.present(activityViewController, animated: true, completion: nil) } }) 

This seems to be correctly placed by the UIActivityController and only works with certain actions:

• Messages - ✔️Works, correctly exports the video.
• AirDrop - "Shows" Failure "
• Dropbox - ✖️ Substitutes the correct view of Dropbox but says "Unknown error"

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Answer 1

I encountered the same odd behavior when working with PHAssets. I assume this is an (intentionally) undocumented security / sandbox restriction.

I was able to work around this problem by copying the main file to the user's directory, and then performing the operation in the copied file.

I did it in a loop. Sometimes a copy fails with an unspecified file resolution error. When this happens, I will try to repeat it in a few seconds (using DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter ). In the end, it works!