WAV files
WAV files are based on the RIFF format which is made up of chunks of data with an id, size and binary data for each. The format is very extensible, and has been in use for over 30 years, leading to a very wide variety of chunks which could be in a file. Applications are expected to ignore chunks they don't use and preserve them when editing files (in practice, many applications only preserve chunks they use).
WAV file structure
TODO: overview and some visualizations
normalization in this book
TODO: note about normalizing field names
other summary documents
- Audio File Format Specifications by Prof. Peter Kabal
- includes copies of original specs from MS & later specs. Overview of file format, sample WAV files.
- Recording Blogs - Wiki - WAV File Format
grammars and parser configuration files
- Kaitai Struct format specification of RIFF-WAVE and many common chunks
- Hex Fiend (MacOS, open source) includes a WAV parsing template which parses many common chunks