SoX - Sound eXchange

Mixing multiple audio files into a single audio file is straightforward with sox.

SoX is available at http://sox.sourceforge.net, but in case you have qualms about going to SourceForge (as I do), I can send you the version for your machine. You can also install it via whatever package manager, in case whatever machine this ultimately ends up running on is a Linux machine.

Combining multiple audio files

sox -m audio_file_1.wav audio_file_2.wav {audio_file_n.wav} output_file.wav

will return an audio file output_file.wav the length of whichever audio_file_x.wav is longest, where all the input audio files are played simultaneously starting at time 0.

Clipping an audio file

Syntax

sox audio.wav newaudio.wav trim [SECOND TO START] [SECONDS DURATION]

so the command

sox input_audio.wav output_audio.wav trim 8 10

saves input_audio.wav from seconds 8 to 18 as output_audio.wav

Output multiple files

By default, SoX writes to a single output file.

A new file is created after the completion of any effects listed before pseudo-effect newfile. The files are automatically suffixed with a number, but this can be customized by placing %n in the file name where the number should be substituted. An optional number can be placed after the % to specify a minimum fixed width for the number.

Example:

Given an audio file 300 seconds in length, the command:

sox -m file.wav outfile%3n.wav trim 0 50 : newfile : trim 0 50 : newfile : trim 0 50 : newfile : trim 0 50 : newfile : trim 0 50 : newfile : trim 0 50

will split file.wav into six files: outfile001.wav, outfile002.wav, outfile003.wav, outfile004.wav, outfile005.wav, outfile006.wav, each 50 seconds in length.

But what are we trying to do again?

Pipes.

(test piping example, add here)