fetching waveform for visualization in c on any music files format (mp3/ogg/etc..)

Question

I would like to know how can i fetch the a waveform from any music file format in order to visualize it using some kind of gui. i would like to use already written libraries instead of writing my own.

any ideas?

thanks!

Answer 1

And for a library to do what you ask, check out libsndfile.

Answer 2

That depends on the music file format. LameLib can be used for decoding mp3s, and libogg can be used for decoding oggs. Uncompressed wav files don't need to be decoded, since the file stores the raw PCM data; you just need to read in the file headers, and there's lots of sample code out there that shows you how to do that.

Answer 3

If a program that lets you visualize an audio waveform would help, try Audacity.