Question

I’ve created an app that records audio, saves the sample to the sd card then plays it back, using the record and play buttons. I need to reverse this sample. I can do all this and the the reversed sample is saved on the SD card under a different name. The original sample is test.wav and the same sample reversed is save as revFile.wav. when i try play revFile.wav android says it can’t play this format.

I’ve litterally put the sample in an array then reversed the contents, something is telling me that there could be header info at the start of the sample that needs striping first, any ideas. thanks.

Here’s what i have so far.

public class recorder extends Activity  {
    MediaRecorder myRecorder = null;
    DataInputStream dis = null;

    /** Called when the activity is first created. */
    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.main);
    }
    public void onClickPlay(View v){
        Log.v("onClickplay", "play clicked");

        try{
            MediaPlayer mp = new MediaPlayer();
            mp.setDataSource(Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory().getPath() + "/test.wav");
            mp.prepare();
            mp.start();
        } catch(Exception e3) {
            e3.printStackTrace();
        }
        TextView text = (TextView)findViewById(R.id.TextView01);
        text.setText("playing");
    }

    public void onClickRecord(View v){
        Log.v("onClickRecord", "record clicked");

        File path = Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory();
        Log.v("file path", ""+path.getAbsolutePath());

        File file = new File(path, "test.wav");
        if(file.exists()){
            file.delete();
        }
        path.mkdirs();
        Log.v("file path", ""+file.getAbsolutePath());
        myRecorder = new MediaRecorder();
        myRecorder.setAudioSource(MediaRecorder.AudioSource.MIC);
        myRecorder.setOutputFormat(MediaRecorder.OutputFormat.THREE_GPP);
        myRecorder.setAudioEncoder(MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.AMR_NB);

        myRecorder.setOutputFile(file.getAbsolutePath()); 
        Log.i("myrecorder", "about to prepare recording");
        try{
            myRecorder.prepare();
        } catch(Exception e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }

        Log.i("myrecorder", "prepared");
        myRecorder.start();   // Recording is now started
        Log.i("myrecorder", "recording");
        TextView text = (TextView)findViewById(R.id.TextView01);
        text.setText("recording");
    }

    public void onClickStop(View v){
        Log.v("onClickStop", "stop clicked");

            try{
             myRecorder.stop();
             myRecorder.reset();   // You can reuse the object by going back to setAudioSource() step
             myRecorder.release(); // Now the object cannot be reused
            }catch(Exception e){} 

            TextView text = (TextView)findViewById(R.id.TextView01);
             text.setText("recording stopped");

        }    



public void onClickReverse(View v){
        Log.v("onClickReverse", "reverse clicked");

        File f = Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory();
        String path = f.getAbsolutePath();
        path = path + "/test.wav";
        Log.v("path = ", ""+path);
        Log.v("dir = ", ""+f.getAbsolutePath());
        Log.v("test file exists? = ", ""+f.getAbsolutePath()+"/test.wav");

        File f2 = new File(path);
        Log.v("f2 = ", ""+f2.getAbsolutePath());

        try {
            InputStream is = new FileInputStream(f2);
            BufferedInputStream bis = new BufferedInputStream(is);
            dis = new DataInputStream(bis);
        } catch (Exception e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }

        int fileLength = (int)f2.length();
        byte[] buffer = new byte[fileLength];

        /*File reversedFile = Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory();
          File revFile = new File(reversedFile, "reversedFile.wav");
          Log.v("reversedfile path", ""+ revFile.getAbsolutePath());

          if(revFile.exists()){
              revFile.delete();
          }

          reversedFile.mkdirs();
    */

        byte[] byteArray = new byte[fileLength +1];
        Log.v("bytearray size = ", ""+byteArray.length);

        try {
            while(dis.read(buffer) != -1 ) {
                dis.read(buffer);
                Log.v("about to read buffer", "buffer");

                byteArray = buffer;
            }

            Log.v(" buffer size = ", ""+ buffer.length);
        } catch (IOException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }

          byte[] tempArray = new byte[fileLength];

          int j=0;
          for (int i=byteArray.length-1; i >=0; i--) {
              tempArray[ j++ ] = byteArray[i];
          }

          File revPath = Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory();
          Log.v("revpath path", ""+revPath.getAbsolutePath());

          File revFile = new File(revPath, "revFile.wav");
          Log.v("revfile path ", ""+revFile.getAbsolutePath());
          if(revFile.exists()){
              revFile.delete();
          }

          revPath.mkdirs();

          try {
              OutputStream os = new FileOutputStream(revFile);
              BufferedOutputStream bos = new BufferedOutputStream(os);
              DataOutputStream dos = new DataOutputStream(bos);
              Log.v("temparray size = ", ""+ tempArray.length);
              dos.write(tempArray);
              dos.flush();
              dos.close();
          } catch (Exception e) {
              e.printStackTrace();
          }

          try{
              MediaPlayer mp = new MediaPlayer();
              mp.setDataSource(Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory().getPath()
                                                                    +"/revFile.wav");

              mp.prepare();
              mp.start();
         } catch(Exception e3) {
                e3.printStackTrace();
         }
          TextView text = (TextView)findViewById(R.id.TextView01);
           text.setText("playing reversed file");
      }

}// end of onclickrev

Answer 1

There is a good description of the .WAV header at link text

Also note that all data in the file is stored as Little Endian order (low order byte of 1 multi byte number is stored at the lowest address….) so you can’t just reverse the bytes. you need to see how many bytes wide each sample is, (usually 16, but check the header) and reverse them in chunks of that size