Question

There are three major frameworks for iPhone audio :

• AVFoundation Framework
• CoreAudio Framework
• OpenAL Library

And in turn CoreAudio Framework has

• AudioToolkit Framework and
• AudioUnit Framework

Is this correct?

Suppose I import AVFoundation Framework into my project and it in turn needs a feature which is provided by CoreAudio Framework.. Can it internally access the features of CoreAudio without importing CoreAudio framework into my project?

Answer 1

AV Foundation Framework is for simple playbacks, also it’s really easy to use.
If, you’ll need more control over your audio, you will have to delete and rewrite your code, where AV Foundation was used.

iPhone audio Engine Hierarchy:

    AV Foundation
---------------------
Audio Queue | Open AL
---------------------
    Audio Units

Audio unit services is the lowest part of Core Audio, that can be accessed publicly. The others all use audio units on a higher level.

BTW, this is the best presentation I came across on Core Audio.