Q: Can I hide the timeline on the Apple TV when I pause?
I'm a big fan of documentaries and love to pause and read evidence that is flashed on the screen. Unfortunately the timeline that appears on the Apple TV when you pause has a huge thumbnail that obscures the screen (example below). Is there a way to hide this timeline while it is paused?
P.S. One workaround I have found is to pull down the settings menu from the top (which causes the timeline to disappear) and after about 15 seconds, the settings menu will hide as well.
iMac with Retina 5K display, OS X Yosemite (10.10)
Posted on Sep 19, 2016 2:31 AM
I tried using the ⏯ Play/Pause button on the Apple TV remote and that did the trick. As you stated, the timeline goes away after about 5 seconds.
I realized that my issue is that I have been pausing one of two ways:
(1) Clicking the trackpad on the Apple TV remote
(2) Using a universal remote
Neither involve the ⏯ Play/Pause button, and both methods keep the timeline on the screen indefinitely, presumably because the assumption is that you'll be skipping / rewinding / fast-forwarding.
That said, this seems more like a bug with tvOS. Regardless of the way I pause, tvOS should realize after about 5 seconds that it's simply on pause and should clear the screen of the timeline — same way it does with the ⏯ Play/Pause button. Hopefully some tvOS engineers at Apple will see and fix this bug.
Thanks for your assistance, Winston!
Posted on Sep 20, 2016 2:10 AM