Now that I've explained which playlists are good to embed in posts, I'll explain how to find them and embed them.
The code needed to embed a youtube playlist is located in what I will call the "playlist homepage". Here's the same example as before:
https://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=CD63BCE86EA89F8B
In the upper right is the code to copy and paste in order to embed the playlist using the third way I described.
The typical design for the "playlist homepage" has not changed much since the beginning of the playlist feature on youtube. However, youtube doesn't make it easy to get to this page. Links to get to a "playlist homepage", and therefore to the embed code for that playlist, have always been hard to find in the user interface, and youtube is not helping at all by changing the design of its interface all the time. That's why I'll share with you later a little program I coded myself to avoid the task of finding this link in the constantly changing youtube interface.
So if you have a video in several parts and want to find a playlist for that series, the first thing to do is to check whether you are not already viewing it in a playlist. Here is a link to the first part of a video outside of a playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx-LpRSbbeA
and here is a link to the same video playing inside a playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx-LpRSbbeA&feature=PlayList&p=CD63BCE86EA89F8B&playnext_from=PL&index=0&playnext=1
In the case you are already viewing a playlist like the link above, you will notice in the user interface a box on the right pertaining to that playlist:
As of this writing, the link to the playlist homepage is in that box ("See all videos"), but as I said, youtube is not very concerned about keeping it that way.
Another way to find a playlist is to search for it:
You search for the title of your video (1) and set the Search options to get only playlists results (2). Then to find the best playlist according to the criterias I talked about in my previous post, you look at:
- the playlist titles (3),
- the preview of the playlist entries (4) to get a hint at whether a playlist contains all the parts of the series,
- the playlist creator (5) in case you find a playlist created by the same user who uploaded the series, in this example that would be user brittle13
- the number of videos for a playlist so that it has no more no less videos than the number of parts for the series you search a playlist for (6)
As you can see in my example, the first page of results are playlists with much more videos than the 5 for the series we're looking for. Also none of these playlists is titled from the series, "Ayn Rand on Donahue 1979". And none is from the user who uploaded the series, brittle13. So what do we do? We can either :
- go to the next pages of results until we find a playlist that fits our needs,
- make the playlist we want if we have a youtube account (which I won't go into in that post),
- or do what we could have done as a starter: go see the playlists of user brittle13 and see if he made the one we want.
To do that, we can either:
- search for his username + the title we think the playlist should have (ex.: Ayn Rand brittle13)
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_type=search_playlists&search_query=Ayn+Rand+brittle13&uni=3
In that case we get exactly the playlist we're looking for as the first result.
- go to his channel page by clicking on his name wherever it appears on youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/user/brittle13
Then, we're supposed to see a Playlists link and be able to browse brittle13's playlists, and eventually find the playlist we want if it exists, and if the user has allowed his playlists to be browsed from his channel, and if he has enabled that particular playlist to appear on his channel. That makes a lot of ifs, and guess what: youtube provides no link to a "playlist homepage" if you access that playlist from a channel. So there is no way to get the embed code from there, at least from the user interface. However, the playlist ID is in the URL (here it is CD63BCE86EA89F8B):
https://www.youtube.com/user/brittle13#p/c/CD63BCE86EA89F8B
So if one knows the URL pattern to the playlist homepages, it's possible to guess a specific playlist homepage:
https://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=CD63BCE86EA89F8B
That's why I coded myself a little bookmarklet to get to a playlist homepage, no matter where I am on the web, for as long as there is a valid youtube playlist ID in the url. I'll share that with you and help you set it up. First, bookmark a page, any page, so as to have a new favorite in your browser. Then right-click this favorite and edit its properties. There are 2 main properties for a favorite, its name and its URL. Change the name to "get youtube playlist" or something like that. And set the URL to:
Now everytime you are viewing a playlist from a youtube channel, select this favorite and you'll be taken to the playlist homepage where the embed code is located.
The code needed to embed a youtube playlist is located in what I will call the "playlist homepage". Here's the same example as before:
https://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=CD63BCE86EA89F8B
In the upper right is the code to copy and paste in order to embed the playlist using the third way I described.
The typical design for the "playlist homepage" has not changed much since the beginning of the playlist feature on youtube. However, youtube doesn't make it easy to get to this page. Links to get to a "playlist homepage", and therefore to the embed code for that playlist, have always been hard to find in the user interface, and youtube is not helping at all by changing the design of its interface all the time. That's why I'll share with you later a little program I coded myself to avoid the task of finding this link in the constantly changing youtube interface.
So if you have a video in several parts and want to find a playlist for that series, the first thing to do is to check whether you are not already viewing it in a playlist. Here is a link to the first part of a video outside of a playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx-LpRSbbeA
and here is a link to the same video playing inside a playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx-LpRSbbeA&feature=PlayList&p=CD63BCE86EA89F8B&playnext_from=PL&index=0&playnext=1
In the case you are already viewing a playlist like the link above, you will notice in the user interface a box on the right pertaining to that playlist:
As of this writing, the link to the playlist homepage is in that box ("See all videos"), but as I said, youtube is not very concerned about keeping it that way.
Another way to find a playlist is to search for it:
You search for the title of your video (1) and set the Search options to get only playlists results (2). Then to find the best playlist according to the criterias I talked about in my previous post, you look at:
- the playlist titles (3),
- the preview of the playlist entries (4) to get a hint at whether a playlist contains all the parts of the series,
- the playlist creator (5) in case you find a playlist created by the same user who uploaded the series, in this example that would be user brittle13
- the number of videos for a playlist so that it has no more no less videos than the number of parts for the series you search a playlist for (6)
As you can see in my example, the first page of results are playlists with much more videos than the 5 for the series we're looking for. Also none of these playlists is titled from the series, "Ayn Rand on Donahue 1979". And none is from the user who uploaded the series, brittle13. So what do we do? We can either :
- go to the next pages of results until we find a playlist that fits our needs,
- make the playlist we want if we have a youtube account (which I won't go into in that post),
- or do what we could have done as a starter: go see the playlists of user brittle13 and see if he made the one we want.
To do that, we can either:
- search for his username + the title we think the playlist should have (ex.: Ayn Rand brittle13)
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_type=search_playlists&search_query=Ayn+Rand+brittle13&uni=3
In that case we get exactly the playlist we're looking for as the first result.
- go to his channel page by clicking on his name wherever it appears on youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/user/brittle13
Then, we're supposed to see a Playlists link and be able to browse brittle13's playlists, and eventually find the playlist we want if it exists, and if the user has allowed his playlists to be browsed from his channel, and if he has enabled that particular playlist to appear on his channel. That makes a lot of ifs, and guess what: youtube provides no link to a "playlist homepage" if you access that playlist from a channel. So there is no way to get the embed code from there, at least from the user interface. However, the playlist ID is in the URL (here it is CD63BCE86EA89F8B):
https://www.youtube.com/user/brittle13#p/c/CD63BCE86EA89F8B
So if one knows the URL pattern to the playlist homepages, it's possible to guess a specific playlist homepage:
https://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=CD63BCE86EA89F8B
That's why I coded myself a little bookmarklet to get to a playlist homepage, no matter where I am on the web, for as long as there is a valid youtube playlist ID in the url. I'll share that with you and help you set it up. First, bookmark a page, any page, so as to have a new favorite in your browser. Then right-click this favorite and edit its properties. There are 2 main properties for a favorite, its name and its URL. Change the name to "get youtube playlist" or something like that. And set the URL to:
- Code:
javascript:void(location.href='http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p='+location.href.match(/[^A-Z0-9]([A-Z0-9]{16})([^A-Z0-9]|$)/)[1])
Now everytime you are viewing a playlist from a youtube channel, select this favorite and you'll be taken to the playlist homepage where the embed code is located.
