PyWave

Open, read and write Wave files

PyWave is a small extension that enables you to open and read the data of any WAVE-RIFF file.
It supports PCM, IEEE-FLOAT, EXTENSIBLE and a few other wave formats (including 32 and 64 bit waves).
It can also create and write wave files, but it's currently limited to PCM-Waves and pure data (no metadata).

Tiny documentation

About PyWave

PyWave is supposed to replace the builtin Python extension wave, which doesn't support >16-bit wave files.

Using PyWave

To install PyWave you can use the PyPI:

pip install PyWave

To use PyWave in a script, you have to import the package PyWave using

import PyWave

or a wildcard import:

from PyWave import *

The Wave class

You can use open(path) to open and read a wave file.

Or you can use

open(path[, mode = 'r', channels = 2, frequency = 48000, bits_per_sample = 16, format = WAVE_FORMAT_PCM])

with <mode> set to 'w' to open and create a writable wave file.

Both will return an instance of the Wave class.

The following methods are provided by the Wave class:

Wave.read([max_bytes = None]) -> <bytes> data
    Reads and returns at most <max_bytes> bytes of data.
    If <max_bytes> is None, reads until the end.

Wave.read_samples(number_of_samples) -> <bytes> data
    Reads and returns at most <number_of_samples> samples of data.
    
Wave.write(data) -> None
    Writes <data> to the data chunk of the wave file.
    Before write can be called, the following members have to be set:
    - Wave.channels
    - Wave.frequency
    - Wave.bits_per_sample
    
    This function can only append to the end of the data chunk,
    thus it is not effected by 'seek()'.

Wave.seek(offset[, whence = 0]) -> None
    Sets the current position in the data stream.
    If <whence> is 0, <offset> is the absolute position of the
    data stream in bytes.
    If <whence> is 1, <offset> is added to the current position
    in the data stream in bytes.
    If <whence> is 2, the position will be set to the end of
    the file plus <offset>.
    
Wave.tell() -> <int> position
    Returns the current position in the data stream.
    
Wave.close() -> None
    Closes the file handle.

And it has the following members:

Wave.format <int>
    Format of the audio data. Can be any of:
    - WAVE_FORMAT_PCM
    - WAVE_FORMAT_IEEE_FLOAT
    - WAVE_FORMAT_ALAW
    - WAVE_FORMAT_MULAW
    - WAVE_FORMAT_EXTENSIBLE
    Otherwise the format is unknown
    
Wave.channels <int>
    The number of audio channels present in the audio stream
    
Wave.frequency <int>
    Sample rate of the audio stream
    
Wave.bitrate <int>
    Number of bits per second
    
Wave.bits_per_sample <int>
    Number of bits per sample (usually 8, 16 or 32)
    
Wave.samples <int>
    Total number of samples in the audio data
    
Wave.data <bytes>
    [Deprecated]
    (only exists if <auto_read> was set to True)
    Audio data as bytes
    
Wave.metadata <dict>
    A dictionary containing metadata specified in the wave file

Example

import PyWave

PATH = "path/to/a/wave/file.wav"

wf = PyWave.open(PATH)

print("This WAVE file has the following properties:")
print(wf.channels, "channels")
print(wf.frequency, "Hz sample rate")
print(wf.bitrate, "bits per second")
print(wf.samples, "total samples")

wf_copy = PyWave.open("path/to/a/wave/file_copy.wav", 
                      mode = "w",
                      channels = wf.channels,
                      frequency = wf.frequency,
                      bits_per_sample = wf.bits_per_sample,
                      format = wf.format)
wf_copy.write(wf.read())
wf.close()
wf_copy.close()

PyTest

PyTest support has been added in the form of a test_pywave.py module, in order to facilitate extensions to the module. In order to use it, one should install PyTest first by running:

pip install -r pytest_requirements.txt

Once installed, you should be able to simply run

pytest

In the repo folder, and see 2 items being collected, and 2 tests passing.