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The Placid Casual · May 8, 2003, 06:35 PM

Just made an important memo recording on my T68i, with the 'sound recorder' feature...

Wondering if there is any way to transfer the file via Bluetooth to my 12" Powerbook? I have had a look at the options on the phone and stuff, but can't see any way of doing it...

I have tried to 'browse' the phone from the 'BT file exchance' program, but get a 'service not supported by device' or "device not validated message"...

Any chance someone could point me in the right direction?

Cheers (as always!)

Marc

(P.S. Is there any easy way I could record something like a 'lecture' using the same or similar method?)

Stogieman · May 8, 2003, 11:44 PM

Yes there is a way to send a recorded memo from your T68i to your PowerBook but the file is in .amr format. I don't know of any applications that can play .amr files.

Here's what you do:

1. On your PowerBook select "Discoverable" in the Bluetooth menu.
2. On the main screen of the T68i select Connect. Make sure Bluetooth is turned on. Then in the Bluetooth screen select #2 - Linked Devices>Add Device>Phone initiates>Computer
The phone will do a search and it should find your PowerBook. Select Powerbook (or whatever name you gave the computer.)

3. Now go back to the main screen of the T68i and select Fun & Games>My Sounds>Memo (your recorded memo should be the last item in your sound list.)
4. Click on Memo with your joystick on the next screen select Send>Via Bluetooth>Send to PowerBook.
A dialog box should appear on your PowerBook asking you if you want to accept the file being sent from the T68i. Click "Accept." The file should be saved to your Documents Folder (unless you've changed the location in the Bluetooth File Exchange prefs)

Again, I don't know of any program that can play a file in .arm format. But I guess this would be cool for backup purposes or if you wanted to clear some memory on your T68i.

The Placid Casual · May 9, 2003, 03:58 AM

Originally posted by Stogieman:
Yes there is a way to send a recorded memo from your T68i to your PowerBook but the file is in .amr format. I don't know of any applications that can play .amr files.

Here's what you do:

1. On your PowerBook select "Discoverable" in the Bluetooth menu.
2. On the main screen of the T68i select Connect. Make sure Bluetooth is turned on. Then in the Bluetooth screen select #2 - Linked Devices>Add Device>Phone initiates>Computer
The phone will do a search and it should find your PowerBook. Select Powerbook (or whatever name you gave the computer.)

3. Now go back to the main screen of the T68i and select Fun & Games>My Sounds>Memo (your recorded memo should be the last item in your sound list.)
4. Click on Memo with your joystick on the next screen select Send>Via Bluetooth>Send to PowerBook.
A dialog box should appear on your PowerBook asking you if you want to accept the file being sent from the T68i. Click "Accept." The file should be saved to your Documents Folder (unless you've changed the location in the Bluetooth File Exchange prefs)

Again, I don't know of any program that can play a file in .arm format. But I guess this would be cool for backup purposes or if you wanted to clear some memory on your T68i.

Thanks for the info. Much appreciated

WJMoore · May 9, 2003, 05:58 AM

I was discussing this very problem with a friend the other day. Funny it would have made sense to check in My sounds but that did not occur to either of us. Thanks for the info. Now to find a way to play an amr file...

The Placid Casual · May 10, 2003, 12:39 PM

While I haven't been able to find an .amr player or converter for mac... I have found one for 'Doze...

All the links are here:

http://www.esato.com/board/viewtopic...2&forum=17

The search for an Apple solution continues...

Peace,

Marc

WJMoore · May 11, 2003, 05:39 AM

There are a few for Windows. There is a DOS program to convert between AMR and WAV and vice-versa available from Ericsson called AMR Converter. I have not been able to find any Mac utitlities that will handle the format in any way. AMR Converter comes with a specification which I could try and use to make a Mac AMR Converter out of but my free time is quite limited.

Wesley

alex720l · May 11, 2003, 10:41 AM

Perhaps virtual pc could help??

WJMoore · May 12, 2003, 09:43 AM

Originally posted by alex720l:
Perhaps virtual pc could help??

Yeah it would, but native solutions are always preferable. However none appear to exist at the moment.

alex720l · May 12, 2003, 12:24 PM

Absolutely.
I have heard good things about VPC 6, so if you get desperate..............

MikeD · May 12, 2003, 10:58 PM

AHH! I've just been searching for an amr converter and can't find one.. now this confirms it.. sigh..

BrettOZ · May 12, 2003, 11:48 PM

Sorry - Kinda new to my T68i - but are the ring tones stored in this sound format too??

veryniceguy2002 · May 14, 2003, 06:27 AM

Originally posted by Stogieman:

Again, I don't know of any program that can play a file in .arm format. But I guess this would be cool for backup purposes or if you wanted to clear some memory on your T68i.

As I have suggested to The Placid Casual in this thread, there is a Linux solution available. If you want to use it on Mac OS X you have to prepare to roll up your sleeves, use the terminal to compile a few packages using makefile, and run the Perl script. I don't know how easy that would be (I haven't got time to do it), but at least that brings some hope

WJMoore · May 14, 2003, 09:25 AM

Ok people I have a very basic interim solution that does work! I scoured the net and discovered that C source code for an AMR codec was available from 3GPP here. After a little bit of mucking around I managed to successfully compile it under OS X - a platform it was not initially designed for. There are two programs to the codec one called decoder and the other encoder funnily enough. I have made these available for download here.

The programs work on (ie. encode and decode to) raw signed 8kHz 16-bit linear audio samples, these need to be converted to an audio format before you can play them. For this I recommend you build and install SoX - Sound eXchange, it compiles fine under OS X.

Ok so now you have encoder/decoder and sox installed. This is how you use them:

Transfer a recording to your computer from the phone, you get a .amr file, for example recording.amr. Run decoder on this file, assuming you run it from the directory containing the decoder program (and that the amr file is also in this directory):

./decoder recording.amr recording.raw

Now run sox on it to convert it to a sound format, in this case an AIFF file:

sox -t raw -s -w -r 8000 -c 1 recording.raw recording.aiff

You should now be able to open the recording.aiff file in QuickTime Player and listen to it. BTW it will probably sound pretty crappy, this is because AMR is designed to encode speech only and is not designed for hifi quality audio.

As I mentioned at the start this is an interim solution. I am working on writing a GUI wrapper around the decoder that will be able to play the raw file as well as save it as a sound file. Ultimately I would like to include the decoder in the program itself. As for the encoder I have not tried it at all yet, my priority at the moment is decoding.

I hope this makes sense and is of use to someone.

Wesley

veryniceguy2002 · May 14, 2003, 09:32 AM

This is a very good news from Wesley! Make sure when you have the GUI version ready it is posted to VersionTracker and MacUpdate so that people outside here can find it!!

MikeD · May 16, 2003, 09:08 PM

Originally posted by WJMoore:
Ok people I have a very basic interim solution that does work! I scoured the net and discovered that C source code for an AMR codec was available from 3GPP here. After a little bit of mucking around I managed to successfully compile it under OS X - a platform it was not initially designed for. There are two programs to the codec one called decoder and the other encoder funnily enough. I have made these available for download here.

The programs work on (ie. encode and decode to) raw signed 8kHz 16-bit linear audio samples, these need to be converted to an audio format before you can play them. For this I recommend you build and install SoX - Sound eXchange, it compiles fine under OS X.

Ok so now you have encoder/decoder and sox installed. This is how you use them:

Transfer a recording to your computer from the phone, you get a .amr file, for example recording.amr. Run decoder on this file, assuming you run it from the directory containing the decoder program (and that the amr file is also in this directory):

./decoder recording.amr recording.raw

Now run sox on it to convert it to a sound format, in this case an AIFF file:

sox -t raw -s -w -r 8000 -c 1 recording.raw recording.aiff

You should now be able to open the recording.aiff file in QuickTime Player and listen to it. BTW it will probably sound pretty crappy, this is because AMR is designed to encode speech only and is not designed for hifi quality audio.

As I mentioned at the start this is an interim solution. I am working on writing a GUI wrapper around the decoder that will be able to play the raw file as well as save it as a sound file. Ultimately I would like to include the decoder in the program itself. As for the encoder I have not tried it at all yet, my priority at the moment is decoding.

I hope this makes sense and is of use to someone.

Wesley

Can't seem to build and install SOX. I first did configure, but then it said something about me not having a compiler I think..

Mike

WJMoore · May 18, 2003, 06:02 AM

Originally posted by MikeD:
Can't seem to build and install SOX. I first did configure, but then it said something about me not having a compiler I think..

Mike

This is probably stupid, but you do have the dev tools installed? What version of OS X are you running and which dev tools (latest Dec 2002 I think)? What is the error exactly?

Wes

WJMoore · May 25, 2003, 09:23 PM

Progress update on my GUI wrapper:
Last night I got AMR to AIFF conversion working. Its been quite a learning experience as I have only ever used Cocoa before and this program requires some use of Carbon and QuickTime routines.

Currently the program can open an AMR file (which involves decoding it first) and export to an AIFF file. Next I want to add functionality to play the file without having to export it. The interface needs to be enhanced - progess information while decoding is a primary desire. Also need to tidy up the memory management a bit.

Here is a screen shot of the doc window, not exactly pretty or exicting but does the job.

Wesley

The Placid Casual · May 26, 2003, 06:41 AM

Originally posted by WJMoore:
Progress update on my GUI wrapper:
Last night I got AMR to AIFF conversion working. Its been quite a learning experience as I have only ever used Cocoa before and this program requires some use of Carbon and QuickTime routines.

Currently the program can open an AMR file (which involves decoding it first) and export to an AIFF file. Next I want to add functionality to play the file without having to export it. The interface needs to be enhanced - progess information while decoding is a primary desire. Also need to tidy up the memory management a bit.

Here is a screen shot of the doc window, not exactly pretty or exicting but does the job.

Wesley

Looks very cool! Can't wait to see the finished app...

Marc

andretan · Jun 1, 2003, 08:29 AM

Hope to see it real soon too!

Cheers!

WJMoore · Jun 1, 2003, 09:35 AM

Yes development is progressing nicely. I have implemented playing within the app as well as progress information. There are some major stability bugs to sort out as well as some interface issues but all in all it is going well. I'm not sure how much I'll be able to work on it in the coming weeks because I have major assignment to complete and exams (finals for you US people) coming up. They are hopefully the second last lot I will have to ever sit so they are kind of important, yay for 5th and final year!

New pic here.

Wesley

macintologist · Jun 1, 2003, 03:12 PM

Great work so far! Can't wait to see it released!

veryniceguy2002 · Jun 2, 2003, 07:13 AM

Originally posted by WJMoore:
I'm not sure how much I'll be able to work on it in the coming weeks because I have major assignment to complete and exams (finals for you US people) coming up. They are hopefully the second last lot I will have to ever sit so they are kind of important, yay for 5th and final year!

Wesley

Wesley,

Good luck for your exam!

Gee... how lucky you are, only 5 subjects in one semester (I saw it from your web page)

Sounds like computer/electronic engineering degrees nowadays has less subjects (and exams!) to do, compare to a few years back...

BTW the rumour out there is that QuickTime 6.3 will support AMR... I hope you can finish your code before Apple release it.

Good work!

WJMoore · Jun 2, 2003, 11:00 AM

Originally posted by veryniceguy2002:
Wesley,

Good luck for your exam!

Gee... how lucky you are, only 5 subjects in one semester (I saw it from your web page) Sounds like computer/electronic engineering degrees nowadays has less subjects (and exams!) to do, compare to a few years back...

BTW the rumour out there is that QuickTime 6.3 will support AMR... I hope you can finish your code before Apple release it.

Good work!

I did more subjects per semester earlier in the degree(s) but they were "smaller" subjects. The ones I'm doing now are worth more credit points so my load is still full (actually overloaded as per every other year).

I saw the rumor about Quicktime. I don't really mind if they beat me to it. It has been a great learning experience anyway.

WM

veryniceguy2002 · Jun 3, 2003, 11:34 AM

Originally posted by WJMoore:

I saw the rumor about Quicktime. I don't really mind if they beat me to it. It has been a great learning experience anyway.

WM

What a coincence! Apple has just released QuickTime 6.3, with AMR support!

WJMoore · Jun 3, 2003, 07:17 PM

Originally posted by veryniceguy2002:
What a coincence! Apple has just released QuickTime 6.3, with AMR support!

Oh well there you go, they beat me to it. There's a new version of iSync as well. Anyone tried playing and AMR with QT6.3 yet?

WM

The Placid Casual · Jun 3, 2003, 07:21 PM

Originally posted by WJMoore:
Oh well there you go, they beat me to it. There's a new version of iSync as well. Anyone tried playing and AMR with QT6.3 yet?

WM

I gave it a go this afternoon... seems to work pretty well so far, however, there is no kind of export facility to turn the file into .aiff or anything...

Kind of limits the usage of the .amr files to a Quicktime 6.3 enabled machine...

Stogieman · Jun 9, 2003, 11:48 PM

I have upgraded to Quicktime 6.3 but I still can't play .amr files. Quicktime gives me the error message, "Couldn't open ***.amr because it is not a file Quicktime understands."

WJMoore · Jun 10, 2003, 12:01 AM

You have to install the 3GPP QuickTime components: http://www.apple.com/mpeg4/3gpp/

Stogieman · Jun 12, 2003, 03:08 AM

Thanks WJMoore! Downloading the 3GPP components fixed it.

Originally posted by The Placid Casual:
I gave it a go this afternoon... seems to work pretty well so far, however, there is no kind of export facility to turn the file into .aiff or anything...

I was able to export my .amr files as .aif and .wav using Quicktime Pro.