We Keep Coding

Java TargetDataLine not picking up any audio?

I'm writing a function to capture an audio clip for ~ 7.5 seconds using a TargetDataLine. The code executes and renders an 'input.wav' file, but when I play it there is no sound.
My approach, as shown in the code at the bottom of this post, is to do the following things:
Create an AudioFormat and get the Info for a Target Data Line.
Create the Target Data Line by getting the line from AudioSystem.
Open and Start the TargetDataLine, which allocates system resources for recording.
Create an auxiliary Thread that will record audio by writing to a file.
Start the auxiliary Thread, pause the main Thread in the meantime, and then close out the Target Data Line in order to stop recording.
What I have tried so far:
Changing the AudioFormat. Initially, I was using the other AudioFormat constructor which takes the file type as well (where the first argument is AudioFormat.Encoding.PCM_SIGNED etc). I had a sample rate of 44100, 16 bits, 2 channels and small-Endian settings on the other format, which yielded the same result.
Changing the order of commands on my auxiliary and main Thread (i.e. performing TLine.open() or start() in alternate locations).
Checking that my auxiliary thread does actually start.
For reference I am using IntelliJ on a Mac OS Big Sur.
public static void captureAudio() {
try {
AudioFormat f = new AudioFormat(22050, 8, 1, false, false);
DataLine.Info secure = new DataLine.Info(TargetDataLine.class, f);
if (!AudioSystem.isLineSupported(secure)) {
System.err.println("Unsupported Line");
}
TargetDataLine tLine = (TargetDataLine)AudioSystem.getLine(secure);
System.out.println("Starting recording...");
tLine.open(f);
tLine.start();
File writeTo = new File("input.wav");
Thread t = new Thread(){
public void run() {
try {
AudioInputStream is = new AudioInputStream(tLine);
AudioSystem.write(is, AudioFileFormat.Type.WAVE, writeTo);
} catch(IOException e) {
System.err.println("Encountered system I/O error in recording:");
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
};
t.start();
Thread.sleep(7500);
tLine.stop();
tLine.close();
System.out.println("Recording has ended.");
} catch(Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
Update 1: Some new testing and results
My microphone and speakers are both working with other applications - recorded working audio with QuickTimePlayer.
I did a lot of testing around what my TargetDataLines are and what the deal is with them. I ran the following code:
public static void main(String[] args) {
AudioFormat f = new AudioFormat(48000, 16, 2, true, false);
//DataLine.Info inf = new DataLine.Info(SourceDataLine.class, f);
try {
TargetDataLine line = AudioSystem.getTargetDataLine(f);
DataLine.Info test = new DataLine.Info(TargetDataLine.class, f);
TargetDataLine other = (TargetDataLine)AudioSystem.getLine(test);
String output = line.equals(other) ? "Yes" : "No";
if (output.equals("No")) {
System.out.println(other.toString());
}
System.out.println(line.toString());
System.out.println("_______________________________");
for (Mixer.Info i : AudioSystem.getMixerInfo()) {
Line.Info[] tli = AudioSystem.getMixer(i).getTargetLineInfo();
if (tli.length != 0) {
Line comp = AudioSystem.getLine(tli[0]);
System.out.println(comp.toString() + ":" +i.getName());
if (comp.equals(line) || comp.equals(other)) {
System.out.println("The TargetDataLine is from " + i.getName());
}
}
}
} catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
Long story short, the TargetDataLine I receive from doing
TargetDataLine line = AudioSystem.getTargetDataLine(f); and
TargetDataLine other = (TargetDataLine)AudioSystem.getLine(new DataLine.Info(TargetDataLine.class, f));
are different, and furthermore, don't match any of the TargetDataLines that are associated with my system's mixers.
The output of the above code was this (where there first lines are other and line respectively):
com.sun.media.sound.DirectAudioDevice$DirectTDL#cc34f4d
com.sun.media.sound.DirectAudioDevice$DirectTDL#17a7cec2
_______________________________
com.sun.media.sound.PortMixer$PortMixerPort#79fc0f2f:Port MacBook Pro Speakers
com.sun.media.sound.PortMixer$PortMixerPort#4d405ef7:Port ZoomAudioDevice
com.sun.media.sound.DirectAudioDevice$DirectTDL#3f91beef:Default Audio Device
com.sun.media.sound.DirectAudioDevice$DirectTDL#1a6c5a9e:MacBook Pro Microphone
com.sun.media.sound.DirectAudioDevice$DirectTDL#37bba400:ZoomAudioDevice
Upon this realization I manually loaded up all the TargetDataLines from my mixers and tried recording audio with each of them to see if I got any sound.
I used the following method to collect all the TargetDataLines:
public static ArrayList<Line.Info> allTDL() {
ArrayList<Line.Info> all = new ArrayList<>();
for (Mixer.Info i : AudioSystem.getMixerInfo()) {
Line.Info[] tli = AudioSystem.getMixer(i).getTargetLineInfo();
if (tli.length != 0) {
for (int f = 0; f < tli.length; f += 1) {
all.add(tli[f]);
}
}
}
return all;
}
My capture/record audio method remained the same, except for switching the format to AudioFormat f = new AudioFormat(48000, 16, 2, true, false);, changing the recording time to 5000 milliseconds, and writing the method header as public static void recordAudio(Line.Info inf) so I could load each TargetDataLine individually with it's info.
I then executed the following code to rotate TargetDataLines:
public static void main(String[] args) {
for (Line.Info inf : allTDL()) {
recordAudio(inf);
try {
Thread.sleep(5000);
} catch(Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
if (!soundless(loadAsBytes("input.wav"))) {
System.out.println("The recording with " + inf.toString() + " has sound!");
}
System.out.println("The last recording with " + inf.toString() + " was soundless.");
}
}
}
The output was as such:
Recording...
Was unable to cast com.sun.media.sound.PortMixer$PortMixerPort#506e1b77 to a TargetDataLine.
End recording.
The last recording with SPEAKER target port was soundless.
Recording...
Was unable to cast com.sun.media.sound.PortMixer$PortMixerPort#5e9f23b4 to a TargetDataLine.
End recording.
The last recording with ZoomAudioDevice target port was soundless.
Recording...
End recording.
The last recording with interface TargetDataLine supporting 8 audio formats, and buffers of at least 32 bytes was soundless.
Recording...
End recording.
The last recording with interface TargetDataLine supporting 8 audio formats, and buffers of at least 32 bytes was soundless.
Recording...
End recording.
The last recording with interface TargetDataLine supporting 14 audio formats, and buffers of at least 32 bytes was soundless.
TL;DR the audio came out soundless for every TargetDataLine.
For completeness, here are the soundless and loadAsBytes functions:
public static byte[] loadAsBytes(String name) {
assert name.contains(".wav");
ByteArrayOutputStream out = new ByteArrayOutputStream();
File retrieve = new File("src/"+ name);
try {
InputStream input = AudioSystem.getAudioInputStream(retrieve);
int read;
byte[] b = new byte[1024];
while ((read = input.read(b)) > 0) {
out.write(b, 0, read);
}
out.flush();
byte[] full = out.toByteArray();
return full;
} catch(UnsupportedAudioFileException e) {
System.err.println("The File " + name + " is unsupported on this system.");
e.printStackTrace();
} catch (IOException e) {
System.err.println("Input-Output Exception on retrieval of file " + name);
e.printStackTrace();
}
return null;
}
static boolean soundless(byte[] s) {
if (s == null) {
return true;
}
for (int i = 0; i < s.length; i += 1) {
if (s[i] != 0) {
return false;
}
}
return true;
}
I'm not really sure what the issue could be at this point save for an operating system quirk that doesn't allow Java to access audio lines, but I do not know how to fix that - looking at System Preferences there isn't any obvious way to allow access. I think it might have to be done with terminal commands but also not sure of precisely what commands I'd have to execute there.

I'm not seeing anything wrong in the code you are showing. I haven't tried testing it on my system though. (Linux, Eclipse)
It seems to me your code closely matches this tutorial. The author Nam Ha Minh is exceptionally conscienscious about answering questions. You might try his exact code example and consult with him if his version also fails for you.
But first, what is the size of the resulting .wav file? Does the file size match the amount of data expected for the duration you are recording? If so, are you sure you have data incoming from your microphone? Nam has another code example where recorded sound is progressively read and placed into memory. Basically, instead of using the AudioInputStream as a parameter to the AudioSystem.write method, you execute multiple read method calls on the AudioInputStream and inspect the incoming data directly. That might be helpful for trouble-shooting whether the problem is occurring on the incoming vs outgoing part of the process.
I'm not knowledgeable enough about formats to know if the Mac does things differently. I'm surprised you are setting the format to unsigned. For my limited purposes, I stick with "CD quality stereo" and signed PCM at all junctures.
EDIT: based on feedback, it seems that the problem is that the incoming line is not returning data. From looking at other, similar tutorials, it seems that several people have had the same problem on their Mac systems.
First thing to verify: does your microphone work with other applications?
As far as next steps, I would try verifying the chosen line. The lines that are exposed to java can be enumerated/inspected. The tutorial Accessing Audio System Resources has some basic information on how to do this. It looks like AudioSystem.getMixerInfo() will return a list of available mixers that can be inspected. Maybe AudioSystem.getTargetLineInfo() would be more to the point.
I suppose it is possible that the default Line or Port being used when you obtain a TargetDataLine isn't the one that is running the microphone. If a particular line or port turns out to be the one you need, then it can be specified explicitly via an overridden getTargetDataLine method.
I'm reading that there might be a security policy that needs to be handled. I don't fully understand the code, but if that were the issue, an Exception presumably would have been thrown. Perhaps there are new security measures coming from the MacOs, to prevent an external program from opening a mic line surreptitiously?
If you do get this solved, be sure and post the answer and mark it solved. This seems to be a live question for many people.

Java audio crackling

When I am playing the audio on my Java desktop application, the sound begins to crackle and fuzz out. I don't know why, any suggestions? I am working on a Pokemon fan game.
static AudioInputStream audio = null;
public static boolean change = false;
static Clip clip = null;
public static void music() {
try {
change = false;
if(!Main.choosegame) {
if(!Main.startup) {
if(Movement.POKEMONBATTLE) {
audio = AudioSystem.getAudioInputStream(new File("Res/music/pokemon battle.wav"));
} else {
audio = AudioSystem.getAudioInputStream(new File("Res/music/route.wav"));
}
} else {
audio = AudioSystem.getAudioInputStream(new File("Res/music/Oak's Speech.wav"));
}
} else {
audio = AudioSystem.getAudioInputStream(new File("Res/music/Title Screen.wav"));
}
clip = AudioSystem.getClip();
clip.open(audio);
clip.start();
try {
Thread.sleep(100);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
while(clip.isActive() && Main.Running && !change){
}
clip.stop();
audio.close();
Thread.sleep(100);
} catch(UnsupportedAudioFileException uae) {
System.out.println(uae);
} catch(IOException ioe) {
System.out.println(ioe);
} catch(LineUnavailableException lua) {
System.out.println(lua);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
} catch(OutOfMemoryError e12) {
clip.stop();
change = true;
try {
audio.close();
} catch (IOException e1) {
e1.printStackTrace();
}
System.out.println("OUT OF MEMORY IN MUSIC");
try {
Thread.sleep(10);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
#Override
public void run() {
while(Main.Running) {
music();
try {
Thread.sleep(100);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}

Curious stuff. Given that you have found a solution, maybe I shouldn't be adding my two cents. But a few things seem puzzling and not quite matching the audio world as I know it.
Usually crackle and distortion are the result of PCM data points exceeding their bounds. For example, if you have wav files with data that ranges from -32768 to 32767 (16-bit encoding represented via signed shorts), and the values go outside of that range, then distortion of various sorts can occur.
This might occur in your case if more than one wav file is played at a time, and the wavs are already at a very high volume. When their data is summed together for simultaneous playback, the 16-bit range could be exceeded.
If the addition of pauses has the main effect of preventing the wavs from playing at the same time, this could thus also lessen the amount of distortion.
There are some situations where it takes an audio thread a bit of time to finish and respond to a state change. But I can't think of any where crackle or fuzz would be the result. (But that doesn't mean there are no such situations.)
Simply bypassing a number of samples, via skip(), should (theoretically) only help if the same crackle and fuzz are on the original wav files, and you are skipping past the distorted section. However this should result in a click if starting from an already audible volume level.
By the way, you would probably do better to run the files as SourceDataLines than as Clips. Clips are only meant for situations where you are going to replay the sounds many times and can afford to hold the data in memory. As coded, every time you play a sound, you are first loading the entire sound into memory, and then playing it. A Clip does not play until all the data has been loaded into memory. With a SourceDataLine, the playback code reads data as it plays, consuming much less memory.
If you can afford the memory, load the Clip only once into its own variable. After playing a Clip, one can set its cursor back to the start of the Clip and later replay the data without having to reload from the file (as you are continually doing).

Is the crackling always at the beginning? If so, I found some code that skips the first bytes to avoid that:
// Skip some bytes at the beginning to prevent crackling noise.
audio.skip(30);
Source: http://veritas.eecs.berkeley.edu/apcsa-ret/program/projects/lesson13/Sound/SampleRateConverter.java

java playing sounds in order

Hi I have following java programme that play some sounds.I want to play sounds in order for example after ending of sound1 i want to play sound2 and then sound3 the following is my java code and function of playing sound .
private void playsound(String file)
{
try {
crit = AudioSystem.getClip();
AudioInputStream inputStream1 = AudioSystem.getAudioInputStream(this.getClass().getResource(file));
crit.open(inputStream1);
//if(!crit.isOpen())
{
crit.start();
}
} catch (Exception ex) {
System.out.println(ex.getMessage());
}
}
and calling it as following
playsound("/sounds/filesound1.au");
playsound("/sounds/filesound2.au");
playsound("/sounds/filesound3.au");
the programme is plying sound in parallel which I don't want.I want to play in order
Regards

I got the following code from somewhere that I can't remember right now but it plays the music consequently:
public static void play(ArrayList<String> files){
byte[] buffer = new byte[4096];
for (String filePath : files) {
File file = new File(filePath);
try {
AudioInputStream is = AudioSystem.getAudioInputStream(file);
AudioFormat format = is.getFormat();
SourceDataLine line = AudioSystem.getSourceDataLine(format);
line.open(format);
line.start();
while (is.available() > 0) {
int len = is.read(buffer);
line.write(buffer, 0, len);
}
line.drain();
line.close();
} catch (Exception ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
The reason this plays the files consequently and not all at the same time is because write blocks until the requested amount of data has been written. This applies even if the requested amount of data to write is greater than the data line's buffer size.
Make sure to include drain() from the code above. drain() waits for the buffer to empty before it close()s.

hardware mic control

How can I control the mic on-off function using java code? I need to control the time for which mic is on.
I tried using the following code in java:
final AudioFormat format = getFormat();//getformat() has the audio format
DataLine.Info info = new DataLine.Info(TargetDataLine.class, format);
final TargetDataLine line = (TargetDataLine) AudioSystem.getLine(info);
line.open(format); //open mic for input
line.start();
byte[] buffer = new byte[1048576];
OutputStream out = new ByteArrayOutputStream();//output the audio to buffer
boolean running = true;
try {
while (running) {
int count = line.read(buffer, 0, buffer.length);
running=false;
if (count > 0) {
out.write(buffer, 0, count);
}
}
out.close();
} catch (IOException e) {
System.out.println("Error");
System.err.println("I/O problems: " + e);
System.exit(-1);
}
But this basically depends on the the size of buffer. And the while loop can input audio for 30secs per pass.
I need to take the sample inputs for just 10secs.
any help?? thanks.:)

It seems you are trying to control the duration of the miking via the size of the buffer. I'm pretty sure this isn't common practice. Usually one uses a buffer that is a fraction of a second in size (to keep latency low), and iterates through it repeatedly. To control the duration of an open-ended read or playback operation, it is more usual to change the value of the "running" boolean.
Thus, from outside of the loop, code updates the "running" boolean, and when the loop notices that there has been a request to stop, the read loop ends.
I'm not up on specifics as to how one gets permission to turn on a mike or not. I know the java sound tutorials talk about it.
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/sound/capturing.html
In their example, they use a boolean "stopped" to control when to end the recording loop.

How to play audio in Java Application

I'm making a java application and I need to play audio. I'm playing mainly small sound files of my cannon firing (its a cannon shooting game) and the projectiles exploding, though I plan on having looping background music. I have found two different methods to accomplish this, but both don't work how I want.
The first method is literally a method:
public void playSoundFile(File file) {//http://java.ittoolbox.com/groups/technical-functional/java-l/sound-in-an-application-90681
try {
//get an AudioInputStream
AudioInputStream ais = AudioSystem.getAudioInputStream(file);
//get the AudioFormat for the AudioInputStream
AudioFormat audioformat = ais.getFormat();
System.out.println("Format: " + audioformat.toString());
System.out.println("Encoding: " + audioformat.getEncoding());
System.out.println("SampleRate:" + audioformat.getSampleRate());
System.out.println("SampleSizeInBits: " + audioformat.getSampleSizeInBits());
System.out.println("Channels: " + audioformat.getChannels());
System.out.println("FrameSize: " + audioformat.getFrameSize());
System.out.println("FrameRate: " + audioformat.getFrameRate());
System.out.println("BigEndian: " + audioformat.isBigEndian());
//ULAW format to PCM format conversion
if ((audioformat.getEncoding() == AudioFormat.Encoding.ULAW)
|| (audioformat.getEncoding() == AudioFormat.Encoding.ALAW)) {
AudioFormat newformat = new AudioFormat(AudioFormat.Encoding.PCM_SIGNED,
audioformat.getSampleRate(),
audioformat.getSampleSizeInBits() * 2,
audioformat.getChannels(),
audioformat.getFrameSize() * 2,
audioformat.getFrameRate(), true);
ais = AudioSystem.getAudioInputStream(newformat, ais);
audioformat = newformat;
}
//checking for a supported output line
DataLine.Info datalineinfo = new DataLine.Info(SourceDataLine.class, audioformat);
if (!AudioSystem.isLineSupported(datalineinfo)) {
//System.out.println("Line matching " + datalineinfo + " is not supported.");
} else {
//System.out.println("Line matching " + datalineinfo + " is supported.");
//opening the sound output line
SourceDataLine sourcedataline = (SourceDataLine) AudioSystem.getLine(datalineinfo);
sourcedataline.open(audioformat);
sourcedataline.start();
//Copy data from the input stream to the output data line
int framesizeinbytes = audioformat.getFrameSize();
int bufferlengthinframes = sourcedataline.getBufferSize() / 8;
int bufferlengthinbytes = bufferlengthinframes * framesizeinbytes;
byte[] sounddata = new byte[bufferlengthinbytes];
int numberofbytesread = 0;
while ((numberofbytesread = ais.read(sounddata)) != -1) {
int numberofbytesremaining = numberofbytesread;
sourcedataline.write(sounddata, 0, numberofbytesread);
}
}
} catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
The problem with this is that my entire program stops until the sound file is finished, or at least nearly finished.
The second method is this:
File file = new File("Launch1.wav");
AudioClip clip;
try {
clip = JApplet.newAudioClip(file.toURL());
clip.play();
} catch (Exception e) {
e.getMessage();
}
The problem I have here is that every time the sound file ends early or doesn't play at all depending on where I place the code.
Is their any way to play sound without the above mentioned problems? Am I doing something wrong? Any help is greatly appreciated.

For the first method you have to create another thread for audio.
For example like this:
new Thread(
new Runnable() {
public void run() {
try {
// PLAY AUDIO CODE
} catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}).start();
Of course you have to make sure that previous sound isn't still playing.

I guess you should run your playSound method in a background thread as mentioned in the doc here
"you'll probably want to invoke this
playback loop in a separate thread
from the rest of the application
program, so that your program doesn't
appear to freeze when playing a long
sound"
Maybe by doing something like
// shared executor
ExecutorService soundExecutor = ...; //Executors.newSingleThreadExecutor();
...
final File soundFile = ...;
soundExecutor.submit(new Runnable(){
public void run(){
SoundUtils.playSoundFile(soundFile);
}
});

The problem with this is that my entire program stops until the sound file is finished, or at least nearly finished.
This screams a threading issue. Have you tried playing the sound in a background thread? By the way, is this a Swing program? If so, use a SwingWorker to play the sound. There are many reasons for this, but one primary reason is that it's easy to track the state of the thread via the PropertyChangeListener support built in to SwingWorker.

You should create a thread that handles the audio playback. But make sure that it is able to mix in sounds, so two shots that happen after each other can get their sounds played at the correct time, without waiting for the prior sound to finish.
There should be Frameworks out there that do the mixing for you.
A good starting point is:
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/tech/index-jsp-140239.html