are the basis for the HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) format originally developed by Apple to stream video and radio to iOS devices, and which is now a popular format for adaptive streaming in general. The 2015 proposal for the HLS playlist format uses UTF-8 exclusively and does not distinguish between the "m3u" and "m3u8" file name extensions. Internet media types The only Internet media type registered for M3U and M3U8 is application/vnd.apple.mpegurl, registered in 2009 and only referring to the playlist format as used in HLS applications. The current proposal for the HLS playlist format acknowledges two media types which it treats as equivalent: application/vnd.apple.mpegurl and audio/mpegurl. Likewise, these are the two types recommended for HLS use by Microsoft. For non-HLS applications, no media types were standardized or registered with the IANA, but a number of media types are nonetheless associated with the historical and ongoing use of the M3U and M3U8 formats for general playlists: application/mpegurl application/x-mpegurl audio/mpegurl audio/x-mpegurl These types, plus application/vnd.apple.mpegurl and application/vnd.apple.mpegurl.audio, are supported for HLS applications by (for example) Microsoft's Windows 10 and Internet Explorer 9, and LG's WebOS. Examples Example 1 This is an example of an extended M3U file on the Windows platform. Sample.mp3 and Example.ogg are the media files. 123 and 321 are the lengths in seconds. A length of -1 or 0 may be used when the media file is a streaming file, as there is no actual, predefined length value. The value after the length is the title to be shown, which is generally the same as the location of the file which is on the second line. On the macOS and Linux platforms, Unix paths are used. #EXTM3U #EXTINF:123, Sample artist - Sample title C:\Documents and Settings\I\My Music\Sample.mp3 #EXTINF:321,Example Artist - Example title C:\Documents and Settings\I\My Music\Greatest Hits\Example.ogg Example 2 This example shows how to create an m3u file linking to a specified directory (for example, a flash drive, or CD-ROM). The m3u file should contain only one string: the path to the directory. After starting, the media player will play all contents of the directory: C:\Music Example 3 Here is another example, using relative format. The M3U file is placed in the same directory as the music, and directories must be preserved when moving the playlist to another device if subdirectories are used. This method is more flexible, as it does not rely on the file path staying