HTTP Live Streaming playlist files

An HTTP Live Streaming master playlist file provides information for your product about the available content for a media presentation.

Specifically, HTTP Live Streaming master playlist files provide information about:

• The media segments that comprise the media presentation
• Available content variants that can be used in the content selection process (for example, content rendered for different bandwidths)
• Available content renditions (for example, different languages)

The master playlist allows your product to select from different versions of the media presentation. Your product can switch to a lower data rate (for example, when the available delivery bandwidth is reduced) or switch to a higher data rate to improve audio and video quality. Your product can also choose to play alternative content for a presentation, such as an alternative language version or an audio description for a visually impaired user.

HTTP Live Streaming playlist files are regular M3U playlists, extended by the addition of information specific to HTTP Live Streaming. This extended information is contained in lines that start with a #EXT prefix inside the playlist. A playlist contains uniform resource identifiers (URIs) that point to media files or to other playlists.