Re: [a little OT] File format for a bunch of floats
Re: [a little OT] File format for a bunch of floats
- Subject: Re: [a little OT] File format for a bunch of floats
- From: Paul Davis <email@hidden>
- Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2010 07:17:19 -0400
On Wed, Sep 22, 2010 at 6:24 AM, Jerry <email@hidden> wrote:
> I have a _lot_ of audio files that have been generated by unusual means.
> They are 32-bit little endian floating point, one channel, with no header. I
> suppose this is some form of "raw." It's just a bunch of floats, all audio.
>
> I would like to be able to have them play by e.g. invoking QuickLook on them
> or other similar means such as within DEVONthink. I don't want to modify the
> file unless I absolutely have to, and then only by automatic means (no
> manually opening in an editor and saving in another format.
>
> I'm pretty sure this is a stupid question, but is there some file extension
> that I can add that will make the OS recognize them correctly?
given that there are absolutely no rules governing the bytes that can
appear in your file, there cannot be. your files could appear, by
chance, to be a WAV file, a PDF file, an HTML file, an executable or
anything else. of course, its not particularly likely that the bytes
representing your samples will just happen to be arranged so that the
first 6 are "<html>", but its not impossible. since the file type
cannot be determined by looking at the file, and since there is no
metadata, there's no way to tell what the file contents are.
several good soundfile editors have ways to import raw audio files,
but you still have to tell them what you're importing.
playing the files is not difficult if you know for sure that the file
is in the format you describe. if you know that, you can write code to
play them. if you don't know that, i don't see any way for any
existing app to deduce it.
--p
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