Tao audio framework brings music to Smartphones

By Bernard Cole
iApplianceWeb
(11/10/03, 02:00:27 AM EDT)

Reading, UK -- The Tao Group has just introduced a new version of its intent Sound System (iSS) framework with enhancements that it believes gives musicians and the developer community a way to provide better and more sophisticated music presentations on mobile phones and multimodal wireless iAs.

iSS is an open and advanced modular synthesizer and audio plug-in framework that allows developers to augment the standard MIDI wavetable sounds with any algorithm or third-party audio plug-in.

According to Tim Cole, Audio Products Manager at Tao Group this development will provide the catalyst for music software developers to create compelling music applications and tools that can feature 3rd party synth modules and effects units, allowing the market for mobile audio plug-ins to grow and evolve just as it did in the desktop arena.

In developing an open and flexible framework, he said, the company is providing the necessary conditions for mobile network operators to actively partake in audio software download business models. Examples of products that can benefit from this framework, said Cole, are MIDI music sequencers, audio mixers, sound effects units, sound design applications, music players, ringtone generators and so on.

The company's advanced modular synthesizer allows some or all of the sounds in a piece of MIDI content to be represented by a simple, compact, purely textual description using industry-standard XML network descriptions - a technique termed as "Vector Audio".

The vector audio is interpreted by the various sound generators, music engines, audio effects modules and third party audio plug-ins on the intent platform, allowing MIDI music to feature custom synthesized sounds.

Vector audio, said Cole, can have significant benefits in terms of bandwidth requirements for custom sound delivery, device storage and consumer creativity. Furthermore, synthetic sounds can be combined as required with both custom sample sounds and pre-installed MIDI wavetable data, together with optional 3rd party audio plug-ins, to suit the specific musical requirements of the content author.

Plug-ins to the framework are binary portable and can be written in any combination of C/C++ or other languages, and can also be written to take advantage of any platform-specific DSP capabilities.

According to Cole, the framework makes possible a wide range of possiblities for mobile mobile entertainment content and services, particularly mobile gaming. For example, he said, 3D audio spatializer plug-ins can be used to apply 3D sound positioning for applications such as 3D gaming and in-call sound positioning. In addition, 3rd party audio visualizers can be deployed to generate graphical representations of music and 3rd party MIDI generators and harmonizers can be deployed within the framework, such as the BAFTA award-winning SSEYO Koan Music Engine;

Also, he said, 3rd party audio plug-in networks can be used to shape sound in a variety of contexts, including MIDI ringtones and sound effects for games

The APIs to the iSS advanced audio plug-in framework are available now for developers to review online, and APIs to the modular synthesizer framework will be added as available.

For more on this product, go to www.withintent.biz.  

This site also contains a downloadable intent Sound System factsheet and a technology white paper on the intent multimedia platform.

For more information about topics, issues and technologies mentioned in this story go to the flashing icon in the upper left corner on any page or go to  the iAppliance Web Views page and call up the associatively-linked Java/XML-based Web map of the iApplianceWeb site.

Enter the appropriate key word, product or company name to list instantly every news and product story, product review and product database entry relating to the topic since the beginning of the 2002.