Introducing the Version 6.4 Windows Media Player Control

The Windows Media Player control exposes methods and properties for manipulating multimedia playback from a Web page or application. Functionality exposed by the methods and properties includes:

• Building custom user interfaces on top of the Windows Media Player control. Buttons, boxes, and menus can be incorporated into your Web page or application for administering the control.
• Performing VCR-like functions, such as start, stop, pause, fast-forward, rewind, mute, and volume adjustment.
• Monitoring stream and station performance.
• Retrieving information about the content, such as the title, author, and copyright date.

Your application or Web page can also be designed to respond to event messages created by the Windows Media Player control. Events that cause the Windows Media Player control to create an event message include the following:

• Warnings and errors encountered by the control.
• Changes in the state of the stream, such as from a play state to a paused state.
• Keyboard and mouse input.
• Control disconnecting from a stream server.
• Script commands received by the control.

Windows Media Player is also provided as a stand-alone player application based on the same technology as the Windows Media Player control. However, the control enables you to create a user interface unique to your content, to process any type of script commands, and to integrate multimedia presentations into larger Web applications.