Android - Playing mp3 from byte[]

Question

I have my mp3 file in byte[] (downloaded from an service) and I would like to play it on my device similar to how you can play files:

MediaPlayer mp = new MediaPlayer();
mp.setDataSource(PATH_TO_FILE);
mp.prepare();
mp.start();

But I can't seem to find a way to do it. I wouldn't mind saving file to phone and then playing it. How can I play the file, or download then play it?

Answer 1

OK, thanks to all of you but I needed to play mp3 from byte[] as I get that from .NET webservice (don't wish to store dynamically generated mp3s on server).

In the end - there are number of "gotchas" to play simple mp3... here is code for anyone who needs it:

private MediaPlayer mediaPlayer = new MediaPlayer();
private void playMp3(byte[] mp3SoundByteArray) {
    try {
        // create temp file that will hold byte array
        File tempMp3 = File.createTempFile("kurchina", "mp3", getCacheDir());
        tempMp3.deleteOnExit();
        FileOutputStream fos = new FileOutputStream(tempMp3);
        fos.write(mp3SoundByteArray);
        fos.close();

        // resetting mediaplayer instance to evade problems
        mediaPlayer.reset();

        // In case you run into issues with threading consider new instance like:
        // MediaPlayer mediaPlayer = new MediaPlayer();                     

        // Tried passing path directly, but kept getting 
        // "Prepare failed.: status=0x1"
        // so using file descriptor instead
        FileInputStream fis = new FileInputStream(tempMp3);
        mediaPlayer.setDataSource(fis.getFD());

        mediaPlayer.prepare();
        mediaPlayer.start();
    } catch (IOException ex) {
        String s = ex.toString();
        ex.printStackTrace();
    }
}

EDIT: I've wrote this answer more than 4 years ago - obviously lots of things have changed since then. See Justin's comment on how to reuse MediaPlayer instance. Also, I don't know if .deleteOnExit() will work for you now - feel free to suggest improvement so that temp files do not pile up.