Web audio
MIDI: Musical Instrument Digital Interface When notes are played on midi-capable synthesizer, info is recorded (particular note played, its duration and loudness). A MIDI file is just a set of instructions sent to a sound-producing device (I.e. computer’s
Digital Audio: digitally encoded waveforms (.wav, .aiff, .au ) Can be mono or stereo, qualities from 8 to 16-bit, different sampling rates. Best suited to delivery of short audio bits.
MP3: Motion Picture Experts Group [MPEG] audio layer 3] Popular means of making music available in compressed format that largely preserves audio quality. Big files (1 mg); special players & software required to decode downloaded audio. Streaming MP3
Streaming Real Audio (you need Real Player). Involves large files that play “on the fly” as they arrive from server and are not stored on your hard drive.Great for long audio segments with minimal wait, even over modem. Drawbacks: reduction in audio q
RMF: Rich Music Format Developed by Beatnik ; combines both MIDI and digital audio. Need Beatnik player (more detail in a minute)
Notes:
There are other formats too, including CLIIPSTREAM and a couple of others that rely on delivery methods without a player...
And then there are things like FLASH 4, which allows you to embed a variety of sounds...it may soon support Beatnik, which is already integrated into JAVA and the unreleased JAVA sound API-- in fact, the future expectation is that Beatnik can be used wit
By the way, the Beatnik music platform operates as a plugin to the browser,and allows you to crossfade and beat-synch separate clips, so mousing over doesn’t create choppy sound--and sound can persist continuously across pages