Monkey's Audio

Last updated

Monkey's Audio
Developer(s) Matthew T. Ashland
Initial release2000;24 years ago (2000)
Stable release
10.24 [1]   OOjs UI icon edit-ltr-progressive.svg / 29 September 2023
Type Audio compression
License The 3-Clause BSD Licence
Website www.monkeysaudio.com
Filename extension
.ape
Internet media type no value, audio/x-ape
Standard www.monkeysaudio.com/developers.html
Open format?No

Monkey's Audio is an algorithm and file format for lossless audio data compression. Lossless data compression does not discard data during the process of encoding, unlike lossy compression methods such as Advanced Audio Coding, MP3, Vorbis, and Opus. Therefore, it may be decompressed to a file that is identical to the source material.

Contents

Similar to other lossless audio codecs, files encoded to Monkey's Audio are typically reduced to about half of the original size, [2] with data transfer time and storage requirements being reduced accordingly.

Comparisons

Like any lossless compression scheme, Monkey's Audio format takes up several times as much space as lossy compression formats - typically, about twice as much as a 320 kbit/s bitrate MP3 file. The upside is that no data is lost compared to the input file, making lossless codecs suitable for transcoding, or simply taking up approximately half as much space as raw PCM data.

Relative to FLAC, Apple Lossless Audio Codec, or WavPack, Monkey's Audio is slow to encode or decode files.

While Monkey's Audio can achieve high compression ratios, [3] the cost is a dramatic increase in requirements on the decoding end. Many older portable media players, and even older smartphones, have difficulty handling this. In comparison, most lossless codecs are asymmetric, meaning that the work done to achieve higher compression ratios, if selected by the user, slows down the encoding process, but has essentially no effect on the decoding requirements. [4]

Licensing

On 10 August 2023, with the release of version 10.18, Monkey's Audio switched to the Open Source Initiative-approved 3-Clause BSD Licence. [5]

Other lossless codecs such as FLAC and WavPack are also available under open source licences, and are well supported in Linux distributions and in many applications. Since all of these formats are lossless, users can transcode between formats without generation loss.

Supported platforms

Officially, Monkey's Audio is available only for the Microsoft Windows platform. As of version 4.02 (19 January 2009) a DirectShow filter is distributed with the installer, allowing for compatibility with most media players running on the Windows operating system. [5]

Monkey's Audio is also supported on Linux and OS X using JRiver Media Center or Plex.

A GPL-licensed version of the Monkey's Audio decoder has been independently written for Rockbox and is included in FFmpeg. [6] [7] This code also provides playback support in applications that use GStreamer, [8] as well as DeaDBeeF.

A number of Mac OS X players and rippers support the format as well. [9] It is also available as a port and package on FreeBSD. [10]

Monkey's Audio files can be encoded and decoded on any platform which has a J2SE implementation, by the means of the unofficial JMAC library, which is free software licensed under the GNU LGPL.

Hardware support

Monkey's Audio is supported natively on all modern Cowon multimedia media players, the FiiO X Series and some Cayin digital audio players.

On other hardware platforms, the open source firmware project Rockbox supports playback of Monkey's Audio files on most of its supported targets, but many lack sufficient processing power to play them on the higher compression settings. [4]

See also

Related Research Articles

An audio file format is a file format for storing digital audio data on a computer system. The bit layout of the audio data is called the audio coding format and can be uncompressed, or compressed to reduce the file size, often using lossy compression. The data can be a raw bitstream in an audio coding format, but it is usually embedded in a container format or an audio data format with defined storage layer.

A codec is a device or computer program that encodes or decodes a data stream or signal. Codec is a portmanteau of coder/decoder.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lossy compression</span> Data compression approach that reduces data size while discarding or changing some of it

In information technology, lossy compression or irreversible compression is the class of data compression methods that uses inexact approximations and partial data discarding to represent the content. These techniques are used to reduce data size for storing, handling, and transmitting content. The different versions of the photo of the cat on this page show how higher degrees of approximation create coarser images as more details are removed. This is opposed to lossless data compression which does not degrade the data. The amount of data reduction possible using lossy compression is much higher than using lossless techniques.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ogg</span> Open container format maintained by the Xiph.Org Foundation

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Windows Media Audio (WMA) is a series of audio codecs and their corresponding audio coding formats developed by Microsoft. It is a proprietary technology that forms part of the Windows Media framework. WMA consists of four distinct codecs. The original WMA codec, known simply as WMA, was conceived as a competitor to the popular MP3 and RealAudio codecs. WMA Pro, a newer and more advanced codec, supports multichannel and high resolution audio. A lossless codec, WMA Lossless, compresses audio data without loss of audio fidelity. WMA Voice, targeted at voice content, applies compression using a range of low bit rates. Microsoft has also developed a digital container format called Advanced Systems Format to store audio encoded by WMA.

Adaptive Transform Acoustic Coding (ATRAC) is a family of proprietary audio compression algorithms developed by Sony. MiniDisc was the first commercial product to incorporate ATRAC, in 1992. ATRAC allowed a relatively small disc like MiniDisc to have the same running time as CD while storing audio information with minimal perceptible loss in quality. Improvements to the codec in the form of ATRAC3, ATRAC3plus, and ATRAC Advanced Lossless followed in 1999, 2002, and 2006 respectively.

Shorten (SHN) is a file format used for compressing audio data. It is a form of data compression of files and is used to losslessly compress CD-quality audio files. Shorten is no longer developed and other lossless audio codecs such as FLAC, Monkey's Audio (APE), TTA, and WavPack (WV) have become more popular. It is still in use to trade concert recordings that are already encoded as Shorten files. Shorten files use the .shn file extension.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">FLAC</span> Lossless digital audio coding format

FLAC is an audio coding format for lossless compression of digital audio, developed by the Xiph.Org Foundation, and is also the name of the free software project producing the FLAC tools, the reference software package that includes a codec implementation. Digital audio compressed by FLAC's algorithm can typically be reduced to between 50 and 70 percent of its original size and decompresses to an identical copy of the original audio data.

Theora is a free lossy video compression format. It was developed by the Xiph.Org Foundation and distributed without licensing fees alongside their other free and open media projects, including the Vorbis audio format and the Ogg container.

The Apple Lossless Audio Codec (ALAC), also known as Apple Lossless, or Apple Lossless Encoder (ALE), is an audio coding format, and its reference audio codec implementation, developed by Apple Inc. for lossless data compression of digital music. After initially keeping it proprietary from its inception in 2004, in late 2011 Apple made the codec available open source and royalty-free. Traditionally, Apple has referred to the codec as Apple Lossless, though more recently it has begun to use the abbreviated term ALAC when referring to the codec.

Transcoding is the direct digital-to-digital conversion of one encoding to another, such as for video data files, audio files, or character encoding. This is usually done in cases where a target device does not support the format or has limited storage capacity that mandates a reduced file size, or to convert incompatible or obsolete data to a better-supported or modern format.

WavPack is a free and open-source lossless audio compression format and application implementing the format. It is unique in the way that it supports hybrid audio compression alongside normal compression which is similar to how FLAC works. It also supports compressing a wide variety of lossless formats, including various variants of PCM and also DSD as used in SACDs, together with its support for surround audio.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rockbox</span> Firmware replacement for various devices

Rockbox is a free and open-source software replacement for the OEM firmware in various forms of digital audio players (DAPs) with an original kernel. It offers an alternative to the player's operating system, in many cases without removing the original firmware, which provides a plug-in architecture for adding various enhancements and functions. Enhancements include personal digital assistant (PDA) functions, applications, utilities, and games. Rockbox can also retrofit video playback functions on players first released in mid-2000. Rockbox includes a voice-driven user-interface suitable for operation by visually impaired users.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Audio coding format</span> Digitally coded format for audio signals

An audio coding format is a content representation format for storage or transmission of digital audio. Examples of audio coding formats include MP3, AAC, Vorbis, FLAC, and Opus. A specific software or hardware implementation capable of audio compression and decompression to/from a specific audio coding format is called an audio codec; an example of an audio codec is LAME, which is one of several different codecs which implements encoding and decoding audio in the MP3 audio coding format in software.

References

  1. ↑ "Monkey's Audio Version History" . Retrieved 4 October 2023.
  2. ↑ "Lossless comparison: Comparison table". Hydrogen Audio. 2022. Retrieved 8 October 2022.
  3. ↑ van Beurden, Martijn (4 January 2015). "Lossless Audio Codec Comparison (Revision 4)" (PDF). Retrieved 8 October 2022.
  4. 1 2 "SoundCodecMonkeysAudio < Main < Wiki". Rockbox.org. 2 April 2021. Retrieved 8 October 2022.
  5. 1 2 "Monkey's Audio version history". Monkeysaudio.com. 10 August 2023. Retrieved 24 August 2023.
  6. ↑ Sebastian, Michael (25 June 2007). "Ubuntu bug entry about Monkey's audio inclusion (Comment 2)" . Retrieved 8 October 2022.
  7. ↑ "FFmpeg 0.5 changelog". FFmpeg. 2009. Retrieved 8 October 2022.
  8. ↑ "GStreamer Monkey's Audio Plug-in". GStreamer. Retrieved 8 October 2022.
  9. ↑ "Audio - Software for Mac". Pure Mac. Retrieved 8 October 2022.
  10. ↑ "FreshPorts -- audio/mac: Monkey's Audio lossless codec". FreshPorts. Retrieved 8 October 2022.
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