SoundZAP v2.3: Description: SoundZAP is a program for converting sound files of various formats into IFF 8SVX files or RAW sample data. Background: One of the amazing things about the Amiga is its incredible sound support. Its BUILT-IN sound hardware is capable of playing sound of higher quality than most of the add-on sound hardware for other platforms. So when I got access to InterNet earlier this year I was amazed that most of the sound files posted in the alt.binaries.sounds.* newsgroups were NOT posted by Amiga users, and therefore were not in the Amiga standard IFF 8SVX format. I then looked around for a program that would convert these files into a format that I can use easily (i.e. 8SVX). The largest help came from Dave Champion (dgc3@midway.uchicago.edu) who gave me a copy of a program he wrote called "mac2raw". But, that program still only gave RAW signed data. I wanted 8SVX files. So we hacked around a while working on writing a multi-format sound convertor. Dave and I worked for a few weeks on it but finally we both got too busy to give it much more thought. Then two months or so later I got inspiration! I found ulaw28svx, by Michael Boehnisch (billy@uni-paderborn.de) somewhere. It worked great for converting ulawed files and it gave me the output I wanted, so I sat down and re-wrote the program we had been working on before from scratch. I got the ULAW and RAW convertors to work, and before I knew it I had what you now have before you! Capabilities: This program converts sound files of the following formats: RAW (signed, unsigned, and ulaw-ed), .AU files, .VOC files, .WAV, and Macintosh sounds. (I plan to put an IFF reader in so that you can change their frequencies but I haven't had time yet. I'll get to it!) It outputs either IFF 8SVX files or RAW data. It auto detects the .VOC, .AU, .WAV, and Macintosh headers, converting appropriately. You can force the program into using a certian sample rate for the output file. You can also force it ignore any headers and convert the file as if it were just RAW data. It can use a variable buffer size and convert samples of any size. There are a few other command line options that will be discussed later. Command Line Options: All options are a minus sign followed by a letter. Some have numerical arguments which should follow the letter (no space between the letter and the number). -w : Output RAW data, not 8SVX -s : Toggle signed/unsigned. This only needs to be used if the program makes a mistake and assumes signed data is unsigned or vice versa. -n : This will cause the program to only output the VHDR and BODY chunks, and not the AUTH and ANNO chunks. If a sample player seems to choke on a converted sample try using this option. -f : Force the program to assume the input data is RAW. Use this if the header of a file is corrupted and SoundZAP is choking on it. You may then have to edit the sample to get rid of any headers or other non-sample data that doesn't get stripped. -b : This will change the size of the buffer the program uses while converting the sample. If you have only a small amount of memory you may have to use this switch, but remember: the larger the buffer the faster the conversion. The default is 50K and n is in K, so "-b1000" would create a 1000 kilobyte (or 1 Megabyte) buffer. -r : This changes the sample rate for the output data. This switch overrides any headers in the source file. Possible values for n are the following: 5 = 5696 samples/sec 7 = 7596 samples/sec 8 = 8000 samples/sec 1 = 11395 samples/sec 2 = 22790 samples/sec This switch will also accept explicit declarations of the sample rate, not just the above abbreviations. Just enter the sample rate right after the '-r' on the command line. Example: "-r2203" would set the sample rate to 2203 samples per second. The default is 11395 samples/sec for RAW data. Registration: I am not asking for any money for this program. It was not that difficult to write and I enjoyed doing it. If YOU feel obligated to send something what you could do is send me any information on sound formats that you think would be useful for future versions. That would probably be the most helpful thing you could do. Updates: I will try to keep the most up-to-date versions on ab20.larc.nasa.gov for people with FTP access. If you don't have FTP access I can send you the latest version via Internet E-Mail. Finally, I can Snail-Mail you the latest version if you have no other way of finding it, but you'll have to send me enough money to cover the price of a disk and postage. Thanks: Thanks to Guido, Michael, Brian Foley. See source for why! And I especially want to thank Dave who helped TREMENDOUSLY with the first attempt, which was the basis for this version. Also thanks to everyone who sent me mail and tested the new version of this program. Author: Michael Cramer (mrc113@psuvm.psu.edu) You can contact me at the above E-Mail address from September to November and from January to April. You can also Snail-Mail me anytime at the following address: 1015 Lindbergh Ave. Stroudsburg, PA 18360 Use E-Mail if you can, becasue it's MUCH faster for me. If you find ANY bugs or things you think should be changed contact me and I'll do my best to fix them. I would especially like someone to check out the .VOC conversion stuff because it was basically a stab in the dark! Please don't make any changes to my source, mail me and I'll release a fixed version. If you have the specifications and/or a sample of another storage format please mail it to me. I can only support formats that I have access to, and I don't have time to look all over the place for different formats. Thanks! See the file "history" for release history and future plans. This version of SoundZAP was compiled with DICE version 2.06.40 in April of 1992.