title: iphone html 5 video - how to start from different time
body: <p>What is the correct way to begin playback of a video from a specific time? </p>
  
  <p>Currently, the approach we use is to check at an interval whether it's possible to seek via currentTime and then seek. The problem with this is, when the video fullscreen view pops up, it begins playback from the beginning for up to a second before seeking.</p>
  
  <p>I've tried events such as <code>onloadmetadata</code> and <code>canplay</code>, but those seem to happen too early.</p>
  
  <p><strong>Added information</strong>:
  It seems the very best I can do is to set a timer that tries to set <code>currentTime</code> repeatedly as soon as <code>play()</code> is called, however, this is not immediate enough. The video loads from the beginning, and after about a second, depending on the device, jumps. This is a problem for me as it provides an unsatisfactory experience to the user.</p>
  
  <p>It seems like there can be no solution which does better, but I'm trying to see if there is either:
  a) something clever/undocumented which I have missed which allows you to either seek before loading or otherwise indicate that the video needs to start not from 00:00 but from an arbitrary point
  b) something clever which allows you to hide the video while it's playing and not display it until it has seeked (So you would see a longer delay on the phone before the fullscreen video window pops up, but it would start immediately where I need it to instead of seeking)</p>