Backing up Smart Playlists

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Backing up Smart Playlists

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Q: I’ve made a habit of frequently backing up my manual playlists by exporting them to a text file with iTunes’ “Export Song List…” function, but doing this for my many Smart Playlists would be silly, as it wouldn’t preserve the logic I’ve created. Is there a way to automatically export my Smart Playlist’s conditions into a text file?

- Anonymous

A: Export Smart Playlist Criteria, an AppleScript for Mac users from Doug’s AppleScripts for iTunes, does even better than that. It produces an XML file specifically tailored to be later imported into iTunes using its “Import…” functionality. The script just debuted three days ago on Doug’s site, and we’ll be using it regularly - it’s awesome.

We’ve not yet been able to track down anything similar for PC users. Although AppleScripts only work for Mac users, however, it is possible to import the resulting XML files on Windows PCs. Because of this, the script could also be seen as an efficient way to share Smart Playlists among users - we may be using it in that capacity for our site’s tutorials in the future.

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