man/flac.sgml

   1 <!doctype refentry PUBLIC "-//Davenport//DTD DocBook V3.0//EN" [
   2
   3   <!-- Fill in your name for FIRSTNAME and SURNAME. -->
   4   <!ENTITY dhfirstname "<firstname>Matt</firstname>">
   5   <!ENTITY dhsurname   "<surname>Zimmerman</surname>">
   6   <!-- Please adjust the date whenever revising the manpage. -->
   7   <!ENTITY dhdate      "<date>November 15, 2001</date>">
   8   <!-- SECTION should be 1-8, maybe w/ subsection other parameters are
   9        allowed: see man(7), man(1). -->
  10   <!ENTITY dhsection   "<manvolnum>1</manvolnum>">
  11   <!ENTITY dhemail     "<email>mdz@debian.org</email>">
  12   <!ENTITY dhusername  "Matt Zimmerman">
  13   <!ENTITY dhucpackage "<refentrytitle>FLAC</refentrytitle>">
  14   <!ENTITY dhpackage   "flac">
  15
  16   <!ENTITY debian      "<productname>Debian GNU/Linux</productname>">
  17   <!ENTITY gnu         "<acronym>GNU</acronym>">
  18 ]>
  19
  20 <refentry>
  21   <docinfo>
  22     <address>
  23         &dhemail;
  24     </address>
  25     <author>
  26         &dhfirstname;
  27         &dhsurname;
  28       </author>
  29         <copyright>
  30                     <year>2002</year>
  31                     <holder>&dhusername;</holder>
  32         </copyright>
  33             &dhdate;
  34         </docinfo>
  35   <refmeta>
  36       &dhucpackage;
  37
  38       &dhsection;
  39     </refmeta>
  40       <refnamediv>
  41                    <refname>&dhpackage;</refname>
  42
  43         <refpurpose>Free Lossless Audio Codec</refpurpose>
  44       </refnamediv>
  45         <refsynopsisdiv>
  46           <cmdsynopsis>
  47             <command>flac</command>
  48
  49             <arg><option><replaceable>OPTION</replaceable></option></arg>
  50             <arg choice=plain><replaceable>infile</replaceable></arg>
  51             <arg choice=plain><replaceable>...</replaceable></arg>
  52           </cmdsynopsis>
  53         </refsynopsisdiv>
  54         <refsect1>
  55           <title>DESCRIPTION</title>
  56
  57           <para>This manual page documents briefly the
  58             <command>flac</command> command.</para>
  59
  60           <para>This manual page was written for the &debian;
  61             distribution because the original program does not have a
  62             manual page.  Instead, it has documentation in HTML
  63             format; see below.</para>
  64
  65         </refsect1>
  66         <refsect1>
  67           <title>OPTIONS</title>
  68
  69           <para>A summary of options is included below.  For a complete
  70           description, see the HTML documentation.</para>
  71
  72           <refsect2>
  73             <title>Generic Options</title>
  74
  75             <variablelist>
  76               <varlistentry>
  77                 <term><option>-H</option>
  78                 </term>
  79                 <listitem>
  80                   <para>Show detailed help screen</para>
  81                 </listitem>
  82               </varlistentry>
  83
  84               <varlistentry>
  85                 <term><option>-d</option>
  86                 </term>
  87                 <listitem>
  88                   <para>Decode (default behavior is encode)</para>
  89                 </listitem>
  90               </varlistentry>
  91
  92               <varlistentry>
  93                 <term><option>-c</option>
  94                 </term>
  95                 <listitem>
  96                   <para>Encode from standard input, or decode to
  97                   standard output</para>
  98                 </listitem>
  99               </varlistentry>
 100
 101               <varlistentry>
 102                 <term><option>-t</option>
 103                 </term>
 104                 <listitem>
 105                   <para>Test a flac encoded file (same as -d
 106                     except no decoded file is written)</para>
 107                 </listitem>
 108               </varlistentry>
 109
 110               <varlistentry>
 111                 <term><option>-a</option>
 112                 </term>
 113                 <listitem>
 114                   <para>Analyze a flac encoded file (same as -d
 115                     except an analysis file is written)</para>
 116                 </listitem>
 117               </varlistentry>
 118
 119               <varlistentry>
 120                 <term><option>-s</option>
 121                 </term>
 122                 <listitem>
 123                   <para>Silent mode (do not write runtime
 124                     encode/decode statistics to stdout)</para>
 125                 </listitem>
 126               </varlistentry>
 127
 128               <varlistentry>
 129                 <term><option>-o</option> <replaceable>filename</replaceable></term>
 130                 <listitem>
 131                   <para>Force the output file name (usually flac just
 132                     changes the extension).  May only be used when
 133                     encoding a single file.  May not be used in
 134                     conjunction with --output-prefix.</para>
 135                 </listitem>
 136               </varlistentry>
 137
 138               <varlistentry>
 139                 <term><option>--output-prefix</option> <replaceable>string</replaceable></term>
 140                 <listitem>
 141                   <para>Prefix each output file name with the given
 142                     string.  This can be useful for encoding/decoding
 143                     files to a different directory.  Make sure if your
 144                     string is a path name that it ends with a trailing
 145                     `/' (slash).</para>
 146                 </listitem>
 147               </varlistentry>
 148
 149               <varlistentry>
 150                 <term><option>--delete-input-file</option>
 151                 </term>
 152                 <listitem>
 153                   <para>Automatically delete the input file after a
 154                     successful encode or decode.  If there was an
 155                     error (including a verify error) the input file
 156                     is left intact.</para>
 157                 </listitem>
 158               </varlistentry>
 159
 160               <varlistentry>
 161                 <term><option>--skip</option> <replaceable>samples</replaceable></term>
 162                 <listitem>
 163                   <para>Skip the specified number of samples at the
 164                     beginning of the input file (can be used for both
 165                     encoding and decoding)</para>
 166                 </listitem>
 167               </varlistentry>
 168
 169             </variablelist>
 170           </refsect2>
 171
 172           <refsect2>
 173             <title>Analysis Options</title>
 174
 175             <variablelist>
 176               <varlistentry>
 177                 <term><option>--a-rtext</option>
 178                 </term>
 179                 <listitem>
 180                   <para>Includes the residual signal in the analysis
 181                     file.  This will make the file very big, much
 182                     larger than even the decoded file.</para>
 183                 </listitem>
 184               </varlistentry>
 185
 186               <varlistentry>
 187                 <term><option>--a-rgp</option>
 188                 </term>
 189                 <listitem>
 190                   <para>Generates a gnuplot file for every subframe;
 191                     each file will contain the residual distribution
 192                     of the subframe.  This will create a lot of
 193                     files.</para>
 194                 </listitem>
 195               </varlistentry>
 196
 197             </variablelist>
 198           </refsect2>
 199
 200           <refsect2>
 201             <title>Encoding Options</title>
 202
 203             <variablelist>
 204               <varlistentry>
 205                 <term><option>--ogg</option></term>
 206
 207                 <listitem>
 208                   <para>When encoding, generate Ogg-FLAC output instead
 209                     of native-FLAC.  Ogg-FLAC streams are FLAC streams
 210                     wrapped in an Ogg transport layer.  The resulting
 211                     file should have an '.ogg' extension and will still
 212                     be decodable by flac.</para>
 213                   <para>When decoding, force the input to be treated as
 214                     Ogg-FLAC.  This is useful when piping input from
 215                     stdin or when the filename does not end in '.ogg'.</para>
 216                 </listitem>
 217               </varlistentry>
 218
 219               <varlistentry>
 220                 <term><option>--lax</option></term>
 221
 222                 <listitem>
 223                   <para>Allow encoder to generate non-Subset
 224                     files.</para>
 225                 </listitem>
 226               </varlistentry>
 227
 228               <varlistentry>
 229                 <term><option>--sector-align</option></term>
 230
 231                 <listitem>
 232                   <para>Align encoding of multiple CD format WAVE
 233                     files on sector boundaries.  See the HTML
 234                     documentation for more information.</para>
 235                 </listitem>
 236               </varlistentry>
 237
 238               <varlistentry>
 239                 <term><option>-S</option> <replaceable>{ # | X | #x }</replaceable></term>
 240
 241                 <listitem>
 242                   <para>
 243                     Include a point or points in a SEEKTABLE.  Using #,
 244                     a seek point at that sample number is added.  Using
 245                     X, a placeholder point is added at the end of a the
 246                     table.  Using #x, # evenly spaced seek points will
 247                     be added, the first being at sample 0.  You may use
 248                     many -S options; the resulting SEEKTABLE will be the
 249                     unique-ified union of all such values.  With no -S
 250                     options, flac defaults to '-S 100x'.  Use -S- for
 251                     no SEEKTABLE.  Note: '-S #x' will not work if the
 252                     encoder can't determine the input size before
 253                     starting.  Note: if you use '-S #' and # is >=
 254                     samples in the input, there will be either no seek
 255                     point entered (if the input size is determinable
 256                     before encoding starts) or a placeholder point (if
 257                     input size is not determinable).</para>
 258                 </listitem>
 259               </varlistentry>
 260
 261               <varlistentry>
 262                 <term><option>-P</option> <replaceable>bytes</replaceable></term>
 263
 264                 <listitem>
 265                   <para>Tell the encoder to write a PADDING metadata
 266                     block of the given length (in bytes) after the
 267                     STREAMINFO block.  -P 0 implies no PADDING block,
 268                     which is the default.  This is useful if you plan
 269                     to tag the file later with an APPLICATION block;
 270                     instead of having to rewrite the entire file later
 271                     just to insert your block, you can write directly
 272                     over the PADDING block.</para>
 273                 </listitem>
 274               </varlistentry>
 275
 276               <varlistentry>
 277                 <term><option>-b</option> <replaceable>blocksize</replaceable></term>
 278
 279                 <listitem>
 280                   <para>Default is 1152 for -l 0, else 4608; must be
 281                     192/576/1152/2304/4608/256/512/1024/2048/4096/8192/16384/32768
 282                     (unless --lax is used)</para>
 283                 </listitem>
 284               </varlistentry>
 285
 286               <varlistentry>
 287                 <term><option>-m</option></term>
 288
 289                 <listitem>
 290                   <para>Try mid-side coding for each frame (stereo
 291                     input only)</para>
 292                 </listitem>
 293               </varlistentry>
 294
 295               <varlistentry>
 296                 <term><option>-M</option></term>
 297
 298                 <listitem>
 299                   <para>Loose mid-side coding for all frames (stereo
 300                     input only)</para>
 301                 </listitem>
 302               </varlistentry>
 303
 304               <varlistentry>
 305                 <term><option>-0</option>..<option>-8</option></term>
 306
 307                 <listitem>
 308                   <para>Fastest compression..highest compression
 309                     (default is -5).  These are synonyms for other
 310                     options:</para>
 311
 312                   <variablelist>
 313                     <varlistentry>
 314                       <term><option>-0</option></term>
 315
 316                       <listitem>
 317                         <para>Synonymous with -l 0 -b 1152 -r 2,2
 318                           </para>
 319                       </listitem>
 320                     </varlistentry>
 321
 322                     <varlistentry>
 323                       <term><option>-1</option></term>
 324
 325                       <listitem>
 326                         <para>Synonymous with -l 0 -b 1152 -M -r 2,2
 327                           </para>
 328                       </listitem>
 329                     </varlistentry>
 330
 331                     <varlistentry>
 332                       <term><option>-2</option></term>
 333
 334                       <listitem>
 335                         <para>Synonymous with -l 0 -b 1152 -m -r 3
 336                           </para>
 337                       </listitem>
 338                     </varlistentry>
 339
 340                     <varlistentry>
 341                       <term><option>-3</option></term>
 342
 343                       <listitem>
 344                         <para>Synonymous with -l 6 -b 4608 -r 3,3
 345                           </para>
 346                       </listitem>
 347                     </varlistentry>
 348
 349                     <varlistentry>
 350                       <term><option>-4</option></term>
 351
 352                       <listitem>
 353                         <para>Synonymous with -l 8 -b 4608 -M -r 3,3
 354                           </para>
 355                       </listitem>
 356                     </varlistentry>
 357
 358                     <varlistentry>
 359                       <term><option>-5</option></term>
 360
 361                       <listitem>
 362                         <para>Synonymous with -l 8 -b 4608 -m -r 3,3
 363                           </para>
 364                       </listitem>
 365                     </varlistentry>
 366
 367                     <varlistentry>
 368                       <term><option>-6</option></term>
 369
 370                       <listitem>
 371                         <para>Synonymous with -l 8 -b 4608 -m -r 4
 372                           </para>
 373                       </listitem>
 374                     </varlistentry>
 375
 376                     <varlistentry>
 377                       <term><option>-7</option></term>
 378
 379                       <listitem>
 380                         <para>Synonymous with -l 8 -b 4608 -m -e -r 6
 381                           </para>
 382                       </listitem>
 383                     </varlistentry>
 384
 385                     <varlistentry>
 386                       <term><option>-8</option></term>
 387
 388                       <listitem>
 389                         <para>Synonymous with -l 12 -b 4608 -m -e -r 6
 390                           </para>
 391                       </listitem>
 392                     </varlistentry>
 393                   </variablelist>
 394
 395                 </listitem>
 396
 397
 398               </varlistentry>
 399
 400               <varlistentry>
 401                 <term><option>-e</option></term>
 402
 403                 <listitem>
 404                   <para>Do exhaustive model search
 405                     (expensive!)</para>
 406                 </listitem>
 407               </varlistentry>
 408
 409               <varlistentry>
 410                 <term><option>-E</option></term>
 411
 412                 <listitem>
 413                   <para>Do escape coding in the entropy coder.  This
 414                     causes the encoder to use an unencoded representation
 415                     of the residual in a partition if it is smaller.  It
 416                     increases the runtime and usually results in an
 417                     improvement of less than 1%.</para>
 418                 </listitem>
 419               </varlistentry>
 420
 421               <varlistentry>
 422                 <term><option>-l</option> <replaceable>max_lpc_order</replaceable></term>
 423
 424                 <listitem>
 425                   <para>0 => use only fixed predictors</para>
 426                 </listitem>
 427               </varlistentry>
 428
 429               <varlistentry>
 430                 <term><option>-p</option></term>
 431
 432                 <listitem>
 433                   <para>Do exhaustive search of LP coefficient
 434                     quantization (expensive!).  Overrides -q,
 435                     does nothing if using -l 0</para>
 436                 </listitem>
 437               </varlistentry>
 438
 439               <varlistentry>
 440                 <term><option>-q</option> <replaceable>bits</replaceable></term>
 441
 442                 <listitem>
 443                   <para>Precision of the quantized linear-predictor
 444                     coefficients, 0 => let encoder decide (min is 5,
 445                     default is 0)</para>
 446                 </listitem>
 447               </varlistentry>
 448
 449               <varlistentry>
 450                 <term><option>-r</option> <replaceable>[level,]level</replaceable></term>
 451
 452                 <listitem>
 453                   <para>Set the [min,]max residual partition order
 454                     (0..16). min defaults to 0 if unspecified.  Default
 455                     is -r 3,3.</para>
 456                 </listitem>
 457               </varlistentry>
 458
 459               <varlistentry>
 460                 <term><option>-R</option> <replaceable>#</replaceable></term>
 461
 462                 <listitem>
 463                   <para>Set the Rice parameter search distance.
 464                     Default is 0.</para>
 465                 </listitem>
 466               </varlistentry>
 467
 468               <varlistentry>
 469                 <term><option>-V</option></term>
 470
 471                 <listitem>
 472                   <para>Verify a correct encoding by decoding the
 473                     output in parallel and comparing to the
 474                     original</para>
 475                 </listitem>
 476               </varlistentry>
 477
 478               <varlistentry>
 479                 <term><option>-S-</option> <option>-m-</option> <option>-M-</option> <option>-e-</option> <option>-E-</option> <option>-p-</option> <option>-V-</option> <option>--delete-input-file-</option> <option>--lax-</option> <option>--ogg-</option>
 480                 </term>
 481
 482                 <listitem>
 483                   <para>These flags can be used to invert the sense
 484                     of the corresponding normal option.</para>
 485                 </listitem>
 486               </varlistentry>
 487             </variablelist>
 488
 489           </refsect2>
 490           <refsect2>
 491             <title>Format Options</title>
 492
 493             <variablelist>
 494               <varlistentry>
 495                 <term><option>-fb</option></term>
 496
 497                 <listitem>
 498                   <para>Big-endian byte order</para>
 499                 </listitem>
 500               </varlistentry>
 501
 502               <varlistentry>
 503                 <term><option>-fl</option></term>
 504
 505                 <listitem>
 506                   <para>Little-endian byte order</para>
 507                 </listitem>
 508               </varlistentry>
 509
 510               <varlistentry>
 511                 <term><option>-fc</option>
 512                   <replaceable>channels</replaceable></term>
 513
 514                 <listitem>
 515                   <para>Set number of channels.</para>
 516                 </listitem>
 517               </varlistentry>
 518
 519               <varlistentry>
 520                 <term><option>-fp</option>
 521                   <replaceable>bits_per_sample</replaceable></term>
 522
 523                 <listitem>
 524                   <para>Set bits per sample.</para>
 525                 </listitem>
 526               </varlistentry>
 527
 528               <varlistentry>
 529                 <term><option>-fs</option>
 530                   <replaceable>sample_rate</replaceable></term>
 531
 532                 <listitem>
 533                   <para>Set sample rate (in Hz).</para>
 534                 </listitem>
 535               </varlistentry>
 536
 537               <varlistentry>
 538                 <term><option>-fu</option></term>
 539
 540                 <listitem>
 541                   <para>Unsigned samples (default is signed)</para>
 542                 </listitem>
 543               </varlistentry>
 544
 545               <varlistentry>
 546                 <term><option>-fr</option></term>
 547
 548                 <listitem>
 549                   <para>Force to raw format (even if filename ends
 550                     in <filename>.wav</filename>).</para>
 551                 </listitem>
 552               </varlistentry>
 553
 554             </variablelist>
 555           </refsect2>
 556
 557         </refsect1>
 558           <refsect1>
 559             <title>SEE ALSO</title>
 560
 561             <para>The programs are documented fully by HTML format
 562               documentation, available in
 563               <filename>/usr/share/doc/flac/html</filename> on
 564                 &debian; systems.</para>
 565           </refsect1>
 566           <refsect1>
 567             <title>AUTHOR</title>
 568
 569             <para>This manual page was written by &dhusername; &dhemail; for
 570               the &debian; system (but may be used by others).</para>
 571
 572             <!-- <para>Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify
 573             this document under the terms of the <acronym>GNU</acronym> Free
 574             Documentation License, Version 1.1 or any later version
 575             published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant
 576             Sections, no Front-Cover Texts and no Back-Cover Texts.  A copy
 577             of the license can be found under
 578           <filename>/usr/share/common-licenses/FDL</filename>.</para> -->
 579
 580         </refsect1>
 581       </refentry>
 582
 583         <!-- Keep this comment at the end of the file
 584               Local variables:
 585               mode: sgml
 586               sgml-omittag:t
 587               sgml-shorttag:t
 588               sgml-minimize-attributes:nil
 589               sgml-always-quote-attributes:t
 590               sgml-indent-step:2
 591               sgml-indent-data:t
 592               sgml-parent-document:nil
 593               sgml-default-dtd-file:nil
 594               sgml-exposed-tags:nil
 595               sgml-local-catalogs:nil
 596               sgml-local-ecat-files:nil
 597               End:
 598               -->