Bulk Convert Windows Media Player .wpl Playlists to .m3u

09 October 2011 Last Updated on 19 March 2013 David 0 Comments

If you’ve been using Windows Media Player for awhile, you may have built up quite a collection of playlists. They are likely in the .wpl format as that is the default. If the time has come to convert those playlists to the .m3u format, you’ll find no simple solution to convert them all at once. Let this script help you out.

It is a little surprising that Window Media Player, even the latest version 12, doesn’t sport some kind of bulk playlist converter. You certainly can save a .wpl playlist as an .m3u on a case-by-case basis, but this can be slow to do if you have lots of playlists. Let me show you.

I’m using WMP 12 on Windows 7. With a playlist open, click the List options button at the top right of the Play tab. This will drop a list of options including Save list as...

Select that item and a dialog will appear.

Click Save and you’ll have an .m3u playlist. Of course you now have two playlists, one in each format, and they’ll both display in Windows Media Player. Just delete the old one. This is all well and good but, if I have several playlists, I don’t want to do this by hand for each one. So I put together a VBScript to do it for me.

To use the script, simply create a text file and change it’s extension to .vbs. Copy and paste the following into it.

'*  Copyright (C) 2011 by David Wright (davidwright@digitalwindfire.com)
'*  All Rights Reserved.

'*  Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
'*  modification or permission, are permitted.

'*  Additional information available at http://www.digitalwindfire.com.


Const ForReading = 1
Const ForWriting = 2

Set FSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
Set Folder = FSO.GetFolder(".")

For Each File in Folder.Files
    If FSO.GetExtensionName(File) = "wpl" Then
        Set infile = FSO.OpenTextFile(File, ForReading)
        Set outFile = FSO.CreateTextFile(Replace(File.Path, ".wpl", ".m3u"), ForWriting)
        outFile.WriteLine "#EXTM3U"
        
        Do Until infile.AtEndOfStream
            Set matches = GetMatches(infile.ReadLine, "<media src=""(.*?)""")

            If matches.count > 0 Then
                outFile.WriteLine "#EXTINF:0," & Decode(FSO.GetFileName(Matches(0).Submatches(0)))
                outFile.WriteLine Decode(Matches(0).Submatches(0))
                outFile.WriteLine
            End If
        Loop
        
        infile.Close
        outFile.Close
        
        File.Name = File.Name & ".bak"
    End If
Next

Function GetMatches(ByVal SearchString, ByVal Pattern)
    Dim Match
    Dim Matches

    With New RegExp
        .Pattern = Pattern
        .IgnoreCase = True
        .Global = False
        .MultiLine = True
        Set GetMatches = .Execute(SearchString)
    End With
End Function

Function Decode(ByVal Content)
    Content = Replace(Content, "&apos;", "'")
    Content = Replace(Content, "&", "&")
    Content = Replace(Content, """, """")
    Decode = Content
End Function

'* Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without

'* modification or permission, are permitted.

'* Additional information available at http://www.digitalwindfire.com.

Const ForReading = 1

Const ForWriting = 2

Set FSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")

Set Folder = FSO.GetFolder(".")

For Each File in Folder.Files

If FSO.GetExtensionName(File) = "wpl" Then

Set infile = FSO.OpenTextFile(File, ForReading)

Set outFile = FSO.CreateTextFile(Replace(File.Path, ".wpl", ".m3u"), ForWriting)

outFile.WriteLine "#EXTM3U"

Do Until infile.AtEndOfStream

Set matches = GetMatches(infile.ReadLine, "<media src=""(.*?)""")

If matches.count > 0 Then

outFile.WriteLine "#EXTINF:0," & Decode(FSO.GetFileName(Matches(0).Submatches(0)))

outFile.WriteLine Decode(Matches(0).Submatches(0))

outFile.WriteLine

End If

Loop

infile.Close

outFile.Close

File.Name = File.Name & ".bak"

End If

Function GetMatches(ByVal SearchString, ByVal Pattern)

Dim Match

Dim Matches

With New RegExp

.Pattern = Pattern

.IgnoreCase = True

.Global = False

.MultiLine = True

Set GetMatches = .Execute(SearchString)

End With

End Function

Function Decode(ByVal Content)

Content = Replace(Content, "'", "'")

Content = Replace(Content, "&", "&")

Content = Replace(Content, """, """")

Decode = Content

End Function

Alternatively, you may download the script in a zip file below. Once you have the file, all you need to do is place it in the folder where you have your .wpl playlists. The default location is in a folder named Playlists in your Music folder, however, your mileage may vary. Once there simply double-click the file to run it. It will scan the folder looking for every .wpl file and create an .m3u from it. Afterwards, it will rename the .wpl by appending .bak onto it’s name. This will prevent WMP from reading it any longer and leave you a backup of your original playlist in case anything goes wrong.

Speaking of things going wrong, the script offers no error handling at this time so be careful with it. Personally, I recommend always backing up your current playlists somewhere else before you even begin. ONLY AFTER backing up first, would I run this script. It’s nice to be able to put things back in case disaster strikes! Winking smile

Any questions, comments or requests are certainly welcome. Thanks for reading everyone.

Tags: m3u, Playlists, Windows Media Player, wmp

Bulk Convert Windows Media Player .wpl Playlists to .m3u

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