IRCAM to TTA Converter

IRCAM sound files originate from the Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique — one of the world's foremost computer music laboratories, founded by composer Pierre Boulez in Paris. The format was created in the early 1980s to serve the research needs of IRCAM and has since been adopted by academic and artistic communities working at the intersection of science and sound. An IRCAM file begins with a 1024-byte header containing a magic number, sample rate, channel count, and an encoding type field that supports linear PCM (16/32-bit integer and 32-bit float), mu-law, and A-law variants. The header block also accommodates free-form annotation text, allowing researchers to embed experiment metadata directly in the audio file. Because the payload is uncompressed by default, recordings maintain full fidelity through successive analysis and resynthesis cycles — essential in psychoacoustic experimentation. Software such as Csound, libsndfile, and SoX reads and writes the format natively. Key advantages include a well-defined header that eliminates parsing ambiguity, support for floating-point samples essential in scientific DSP work, and deep roots in the computer music community ensuring continued tooling.

TTA (True Audio) is a real-time lossless audio compression codec developed by Aleksander Djourik, with its origins tracing back to the early 2000s. The format reconstructs the original PCM stream bit-for-bit upon decoding, guaranteeing that no sonic detail is lost during storage or transfer. TTA handles standard CD-quality audio as well as high-resolution content up to 32-bit integer samples, making it suitable for everyday listening and professional archiving alike. Processing speed is one of TTA's defining strengths — the codec achieves fast encoding and decoding without heavy CPU demands, keeping it lightweight even on older hardware. The file structure supports ID3v1, ID3v2, and APEv2 metadata tags, so track information and album art travel with the audio. Hardware support appeared in several portable players, giving TTA a practical edge over some competing lossless formats. The open-source reference implementation ships under the GNU GPL, encouraging community adoption and third-party integrations. While newer codecs like FLAC have captured a larger share of the lossless audio landscape, TTA continues to serve users who value its simplicity and transparent compression.