[chuck-users] 1.3.1.2 on Windows 32-bit - sndbuf doesn't get stereodata

[Kassen]

On Mon, Sep 17, 2012 at 08:37:24PM -0400, Rich Caloggero wrote:
> OOPS, found an old post that fixes the problem.  sndbuf only outputs
> mono data, even though sndbuf.channels has value 2. Very strange,
> but the following does work.
> 
> Now if sndbuf could read .mp3 files, that would be cool!  In the
> ugen reference it says that sndbuf can support multiple formats, but
> no mention of exactly what it supports. No info on the wiki either.
> Does anyone know where to find more documentation / info?

Because we (like other similar projects) use libsndfile. From that
library's faq;

"Q20 : Why doesn't libsndfile support MP3? Lots of other Open Source
projects support it!

MP3 is not supported for one very good reason; doing so requires the
payment of licensing fees. As can be seen from mp3licensing.com the
required royalty payments are not cheap.

Yes, I know other libraries ignore the licensing requirements, but
their legal status is extremely dubious. At any time, the body selling
the licenses could go after the authors of those libraries. Some of
those authors may be students and hence wouldn't be worth pursuing.

However, libsndfile is released under the name of a company, Mega Nerd
Pty Ltd; a company which has income from from libsamplerate licensing,
libsndfile based consulting income and other unrelated consulting
income. Adding MP3 support to libsndfile could place that income would
be under legal threat.

Fortunately, Ogg Vorbis exists as an alternative to MP3. Support for
Ogg Vorbis was added to libsndfile (mostly due to the efforts of John
ffitch of the Csound project) in version 1.0.18."

I suggest OGG, I use that myself for compressing my CD's. It means
that less portable players will play your music which is slightly
annoying but I think it sounds better when comparing two equal sized
files. It's also Free (as in freedom) which might make some feel a bit
better (it does for me).... but yeah it is at times inconvenient.


Hope that helps,
Kas.