The NPR Media Player: Better, Stronger, Faster - And Embeddable

by Adam J Martin

Along with the relaunch of our Web site last week, we've also made important changes to the NPR Media Player. The first thing you'll notice about the new player is its redesigned 'skin' that takes advantage of the cleaner layout found throughout the new npr.org. We hope this makes it easier for you to navigate the new features of the player and creates a more seamless experience with the website.

The next thing you'll notice is an enhanced listening and viewing experience. The new player was rebuilt to load faster, require less processing power and use less bandwidth than the previous version, which makes it faster to go from clicking a link to enjoying listening or watching a story.

We've added new features that make it easier to share your favorite stories as well. You've always been able to e-mail a story or send a link from the player but now for many stories, you can use the ↓ download button to save audio you haven 't listened to or want to listen to again on your MP3 player. Also, we've added an <> embed button that allows you to copy the media player code and post an embeddable version of it on your blog or Web site. It's the easiest way ever to show off your favorite NPR stories. We hope you'll find the new embeddable player a fun way to enjoy and discover NPR across the Web wherever you are.

Here's an example of the embedded player, using a Fresh Air story from earlier this summer:

The My Playlist feature has also been tweaked to give you more control when adding new stories or re-ordering a current playlist. Now when you add a new item, the scroll bar moves to the latest item in the list so you'll always know what's coming next as you add new items. We've also taken your suggestion and the Clear button now only removes the items in your list while the current story keeps playing. All playlist items are still saved on your computer for seven days and in future version, you'll be able to use your NPR login to save playlists to your profile so you can access it from any computer or device and share it with the NPR community.

The improvements to the Related Items feature are a direct result of the player's code changes. The new player now runs off our API, which gives it the ability to make smarter decisions about the type of content that will interest you based on the stories you've selected. Now instead of being limited to more general topics like 'News,' 'Music' or 'Books' you'll see suggestions for 'World Politics,' 'Classical Concerts,' 'Author Interviews' and many more.

While adding support to the player for querying our API makes it 'better,' the other code changes are what really make it 'faster' and 'stronger' than the previous version. The new player is built on the free Flex3 SDK from Adobe using ActionScript 3 and follows a developer-friendly object-oriented programming model written using the open source Flash Develop software. Almost the entire application (minus a few design elements and some ad-serving and metrics code) was developed using free and open source tools. It's a great demonstration of the type of full-featured app that can be built using resources from the Web and NPR's open API.

By building the player on the same principles used in the site redesign we now have a media application that can be modified to meet the changing needs of NPR's content and our audience. We hope to add many new features in coming months including API-based searches, purchase links for music and books and true full-screen for video. We also hope to make the frameworks and classes used by the player available to our member stations and the development community alongside our API to help build additional features and customization.

Thanks for all your comments and suggestions during the past two years that helped us improve the new NPR media player. I hope you'll continue to support our efforts with your suggestions in the comments below. You can also tweet us @NPRTechTeam or use our Feedback page if you want to contact us privately.