iTunes doesn't work with .m3u files anymore??

Why not just right-click (control-click), save the file, and then listen/import it that way?

How does Safari behave?

iTunes 7.6 no longer plays m3u files. Your choices are to downgrade back to v7.5 assuming you have backups of the app & library files.

Failing that, your next choice is to configure Quicktime to launch when you click on a m3u file.

The following suggestion comes from emusic's forum posted by user "mrbuzzbozz":

Just got an email from eMusic on the issue and able to use Quicktime within the browser. For anyone else struggling with the technology, here are instructions for using Quicktime, within Firefox, using a Mac.

To set QuickTime to be your default M3U player
(our 30 second samples are M3U files):

1. Go to System Preferences (for your Mac)
2. Click on QuickTime
3. Make sure the Plug-In tab is highlighted at the top and
click on the "MIME settings..." button.
4. Expand the MP3 section and place a check mark in the
box for MP3 Playlist File.
5. Click the OK button and then close the System Prefs.

Thats bull.

iTunes 7.6 works file with m3u files but something about the file type that Firefox uses to handle the file is not working any longer.

I wrote an applescript that will rewrite the m3u file to let itunes 7.6 handle it.

http://www.jforsythe.com/jforsytheblog/2008/01/24/ApplescriptITunes76AndFirefox2 0011M3uFileUnfcker.aspx

The content-type of the M3U file that's downloaded in Firefox is subtly different to that downloaded by Safari and that created by m3u-unfckr.

Here is mdls output for an m3u downloaded in Firefox (which doesn't play in iTunes):

kMDItemContentCreationDate = 2008-02-01 14:30:52 +1100
kMDItemContentModificationDate = 2008-02-01 14:30:52 +1100
kMDItemContentType = "dyn.ah62d4rv4ge804q5z"
kMDItemContentTypeTree = (
"public.data",
"public.item"
)
kMDItemDisplayName = "audio.m3u"
kMDItemFSContentChangeDate = 2008-02-01 14:30:52 +1100
kMDItemFSCreationDate = 2008-02-01 14:30:52 +1100
kMDItemFSCreatorCode = "hook"
kMDItemFSFinderFlags = 0
kMDItemFSHasCustomIcon = 0
kMDItemFSInvisible = 0
kMDItemFSIsExtensionHidden = 0
kMDItemFSIsStationery = 0
kMDItemFSLabel = 0
kMDItemFSName = "audio.m3u"
kMDItemFSNodeCount = 0
kMDItemFSOwnerGroupID = 80
kMDItemFSOwnerUserID = 501
kMDItemFSSize = 58
kMDItemFSTypeCode = "MP3U"
kMDItemKind = "Internet Audio Playlist"
kMDItemLastUsedDate = 2008-02-01 14:50:30 +1100
kMDItemUsedDates = (
2008-02-01 00:00:00 +1100
)

Here is the same item from Safari (which does play in iTunes):

kMDItemContentCreationDate = 2008-02-01 14:57:32 +1100
kMDItemContentModificationDate = 2008-02-01 14:57:33 +1100
kMDItemContentType = "dyn.ah62d4rv4ge804q5z"
kMDItemContentTypeTree = (
"public.data",
"public.item"
)
kMDItemDisplayName = "audio-3.m3u"
kMDItemFSContentChangeDate = 2008-02-01 14:57:33 +1100
kMDItemFSCreationDate = 2008-02-01 14:57:32 +1100
kMDItemFSCreatorCode = ""
kMDItemFSFinderFlags = 0
kMDItemFSHasCustomIcon = 0
kMDItemFSInvisible = 0
kMDItemFSIsExtensionHidden = 0
kMDItemFSIsStationery = 0
kMDItemFSLabel = 0
kMDItemFSName = "audio-3.m3u"
kMDItemFSNodeCount = 0
kMDItemFSOwnerGroupID = 80
kMDItemFSOwnerUserID = 501
kMDItemFSSize = 58
kMDItemFSTypeCode = ""
kMDItemKind = "Internet Audio Playlist"
kMDItemLastUsedDate = 2008-02-01 14:57:34 +1100
kMDItemUsedDates = (
2008-02-01 00:00:00 +1100
)
kMDItemWhereFroms = (
"http://www.straightup.com.au/audio.m3u?episodeId=1072",
"http://www.straightup.com.au/page?n=1072"
)


and the firefox item, after the m3u unfkr, which also plays in iTunes

kMDItemContentCreationDate = 2008-02-01 14:47:59 +1100
kMDItemContentModificationDate = 2008-02-01 14:48:00 +1100
kMDItemContentType = "dyn.ah62d4um4ge804q5z"
kMDItemContentTypeTree = (
"com.apple.traditional-mac-plain-text",
"public.plain-text",
"public.text",
"public.data",
"public.item",
"public.content"
)
kMDItemDisplayName = "audio.m3u.fixed.m3u"
kMDItemFSContentChangeDate = 2008-02-01 14:48:00 +1100
kMDItemFSCreationDate = 2008-02-01 14:47:59 +1100
kMDItemFSCreatorCode = "????"
kMDItemFSFinderFlags = 0
kMDItemFSHasCustomIcon = 0
kMDItemFSInvisible = 0
kMDItemFSIsExtensionHidden = 0
kMDItemFSIsStationery = 0
kMDItemFSLabel = 0
kMDItemFSName = "audio.m3u.fixed.m3u"
kMDItemFSNodeCount = 0
kMDItemFSOwnerGroupID = 80
kMDItemFSOwnerUserID = 501
kMDItemFSSize = 58
kMDItemFSTypeCode = "TEXT"
kMDItemKind = "Internet Audio Playlist"
kMDItemLastUsedDate = 2008-02-01 14:50:39 +1100
kMDItemUsedDates = (
2008-02-01 00:00:00 +1100
)

My feeling is that the kMDItemFSTypeCode is the problem, though maybe someone who knows more about metadata in OSX could shed some more light on this.

I haven't upgraded iTunes yet to 7.6, but witnessed this behaviour on a friend's machine.

When I looked into trying to figure it out, my first thought was that it might be a line terminator issue, which it appears not to be. I clicked and saved the same .m3u from eMusic in Safari (1), Firefox (2), and via curl (3) to see what I could discover.

First off, all three files have CRLF terminators, so that doesn't seem to be the issue.

% file 16079502*.m3u
16079502(1).m3u: ASCII English text, with CRLF line terminators
16079502(2).m3u: ASCII English text, with CRLF line terminators
16079502(3).m3u: ASCII English text, with CRLF line terminators

Next, I thought I'd compare the files using md5...

% md5 16079502*.m3u | column -t
MD5 (16079502(1).m3u) = b4d9b4bd44a0408796bf9a6b7597d65c
MD5 (16079502(2).m3u) = 3d096d8d1583f5508e836784e878c493
MD5 (16079502(3).m3u) = 2480bcf971f2a2c1170c7654cce77b5c

...which ended up showing me that every .m3u downloaded from eMusic is different anyhow, because they create a unique URL each time you make the download request. I proved this to myself by running the same curl command repeatedly and watching the sum change every time, and then running it and just plain looking at the URL change each time. So, that became and invalid test.

Moving on with Taxinator's approach, I checked out the metadata for each of the files.

% mdls 16079502*.m3u | grep FST
kMDItemFSTypeCode = 0
kMDItemFSTypeCode = 1297101653
kMDItemFSTypeCode = 0

Yep, Firefox's file is the only one that has a non-zero value in the metadata.

Why would this be happening, and to be really blunt, why would simply reading and writing the same text file via Applescript (the file un fcker script mentioned all over the net) actually fix this?

How does this meta data get set, and reset?

I find it difficult to believe that this is an issue caused by Firefox, since the symptom arose with an update to iTunes, not Firefox. Needless to say, Firefox's behaviour had not changed at that moment.

So, did iTunes suddenly become incredibly strict about metadata where it had not been before?

Anyone fine a more reasonable fix for this issue other than to force using Quicktime or recreating every .m3u file downloaded via Firefox?