Patent ID: 8103699

Claim:
A content reproduction apparatus comprising: file identifier generation means for generating sequential file identifiers that uniquely identify a plurality of content files respectively which are hierarchically stored in an external storage device; identification information generation means for generating an identifier for each of the respective content files, each identifier being generated based on a same predetermined number of leading characters of additional data describing content of the respective content file and a different one of the sequential file identifiers, the predetermined number of leading characters being less than the total number of characters of at least one of the additional data describing the contents of the content files, wherein the identifier of each of the respective content files includes the predetermined number of leading characters of the additional data describing the content of the respective content file, wherein the additional data includes at least one of a title, an artist, and an album of the corresponding content file; list forming means for forming a list by reordering the identification information with the predetermined number of leading characters of the additional data set as a reordering condition; and reproduction means for reading out and reproducing the content files which are identified by the sequential file identifiers of the respective identification information from the external storage device in accordance with the order of the identification information in the list.