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Topic: What is the file data format for .NWC files? (Read 2803 times) previous topic - next topic

What is the file data format for .NWC files?

Can anyone please advise me of the format (in binary, hex, etc) of the uncompressed .NWC file? I need to extract the note information from existing .NWC files for input to a tune indexing system. Since my .NWC files are in (normal) compressed form, a description of compressed files would be best, but I guess it will be very tricky. If necessary I can uncompress the files first and then decode them. A batch program to change from compressed to uncompressed would help here.

The indexing system allows you to type in the first few notes of a tune, then searches its database for tunes that match, and reports the names found. eg. 1112115 would be the start of 'Good King Wenceslas'. I have several thousand .NWC tunes which I want to add to the index, so it has to be an automated process.

Re: What is the file data format for .NWC files?

Reply #1 –
The format is not openly available, but a couple of us have made an attempt to analyse it (this has been mentioned previously, and NWC haven't told us off yet!)

If you would like the information we have so far, e-mail me: Robin at RPWithey dot info.

RObin

Re: What is the file data format for .NWC files?

Reply #2 –
We would recommend the following approach:

  • Create a MIDI file from the NWC file (the NWC2MID utility in the download section will make it easy to do this in batch)

  • Use a utility such as mf2t to create an ASCII representation of the MIDI file (you can skip this step if you are an experienced MIDI programmer)

  • Process the MIDI information (either the raw or the ASCII version) to extract the note information that you want to index
You could also use the NWCINFO program to extract the title, author, and play time information, if you intend to add this to your indexing system database.

Re: What is the file data format for .NWC files?

Reply #3 –
I presume you're talking about the Oxford Hymn Tune Index scheme?

There's at least one extant program (Perl script, IIRC) that can create that from MIDI files.
I'm interested in knowing more about the project (I've done some indexing by hand for the Christian Classics Ethereal Hymnary).

ODPHutcheson@hotmail.com