The sndhdr module in Python's standard library provides utility functions that read the type of sound data which is in a file. The functions return a namedtuple(), containing five attributes
| filetype | string representing 'aifc', 'aiff', 'au', 'hcom', 'sndr', 'sndt', 'voc', 'wav', '8svx', 'sb', 'ub', or 'ul'. |
| framerate | the sampling_rate will be either the actual value or 0 if unknown or difficult to decode. |
| nchannels | number of channels or 0 if it cannot be determined or if the value is difficult to decode |
| nframes | either the number of frames or -1. |
| sampwidth | bits_per_sample, will either be the sample size in bits or 'A' for A-LAW or 'U' for u-LAW. |
functions in sndhdr module
sndhdr.what()
This function determines the type of sound data stored in the file filename using whathdr(). If it succeeds, returns a namedtuple as described above, otherwise None is returned.
sndhdr.whathdr()
This function determines the type of sound data stored in a file based on the file header. This function returns a namedtuple as described above on success, or None.
Examples
>>> import sndhdr
>>> sndhdr.whathdr("sample.wav")
SndHeaders(filetype = 'wav', framerate = 44100, nchannels = 1, nframes = 99999, sampwidth = 16)
>>> sndhdr.whathdr("sample.aiff")
SndHeaders(filetype = 'aiff', framerate = 8000, nchannels = 1, nframes = 271200, sampwidth = 16)
>>> sndhdr.whathdr("sample.au")
SndHeaders(filetype = 'au', framerate = 8000, nchannels = 1, nframes = 103397.0, sampwidth = 'U')