Using Windows Media Player Playlist Files in Web Playlists

Web Playlists, an IIS Media Services extension for IIS 7.0, includes an Import ASX Playlist feature that you can use to create server-side playlist copies of your client-side Windows Media Player playlist files. For large playlists, this feature provides a good alternative to creating server-side playlist versions of client-side playlist files from the beginning, all while preserving the presentation order of the media entries that you worked so hard to put together in the Windows Media Player playlist.

Windows Media Player 11, the default Microsoft player on computers running Windows Server 2008 creates playlists with .wpl file name extensions. For the playlists that you have already created, it is easy to create ASX copies of your WPL playlist files and import them into the Web Playlists feature for a Web site or virtual directory. Web Playlists creates a copy of the imported ASX playlist file in ISX format, which is a file with a .isx file name extension. The ISX file requires further editing in a text editor before it is available to clients, so using the import feature in Web Playlists is best for larger client-side playlists. For smaller client-side playlists, it may be just as easy to create server-side playlist versions of your client-side playlist files by using the Web Playlists user interface in IIS Manager.

For more information about saving Windows Media Player playlist (.wpl) files to ASX format, and creating and editing the Web Playlist (.isx) files, see Using Windows Media Player Playlist Files in Web Playlists.