[MPlayer-users] playlist file syntax

[The Wanderer]

James Gatt wrote:

> Quoting D Richard Felker III <dalias at aerifal.cx>:
> 
>> On Tue, Dec 07, 2004 at 06:20:39PM -0800, Jessica Johnson wrote:
>> 
>>> Hi all,
>>> 
>>> The docs say that the playlist format is one file per line. So it
>>> doesn't seem to be possible to make a playlist file that includes
>>> a playtree. (Correct me if I'm wrong here.)  It would be useful
>>> to be able to specify, say
>>> 
>>> { "song1.mp3" "song2.mp3" }
>>> { "song3.mp3" }
>>> 
>>> in a playlist file.
>>> 
>>> I've been thinking of modifying the source to expand the accepted
>>> syntax of a playlist file.  Is this something other people would
>>> be interested in? Any core developers want to comment on the
>>> likelihood of this patch being accepted?
>> 
>> it won't be accepted, because it makes it impossible to play a
>> playlist with a file named '{ "song1.mp3" "song2.mp3" }' in it!
> 
> How is that useful? Do you know anyone who puts double quotes in
> filenames? I know you *can*, but...

I sometimes do.

I have an archive of digital copes of episodes of various TV series on
my hard drive(s), and I make it a habit to put the title of each episode
in its filename. In a few cases, there are double-quotation marks in the
title, so the same will appear in the filename.

Also, I prefer to give non-episode non-movie video clips descriptive
filenames, and that sometimes involves setting part of the description
apart from the rest - in a way which is best done with quotation marks.
It hardly happens with every file, but it's still more common than you
might think.

(I've also been stymied, on occasion, by being unable to similarly put
the slash character in filenames (even escaped)... but that's a whole
'nother rant.)

> After all, is there a way to put filenames containing linefeeds into
> playlists? If not then there are already restrictions in the
> filenames allowed by the playlist format over and above those of the
> file system.

...filenames containing newlines - there's an idea which had never
occurred to me... and I *really* don't see how that could be useful.

-- 
       The Wanderer

Warning: Simply because I argue an issue does not mean I agree with any
side of it.

A government exists to serve its citizens, not to control them.