AES31

AES31 is a file transfer format standardized by the Audio Engineering Society( AES) for exchanging digital audio and project data between different digital audio workstations( DAW).

Data exchange between audio workstations is a critical task for professional audio engineering in film, radio, television, and the music industry. That's why the Audio Engineering Society addressed this issue early on and specified the AES31 standard back in 2001.

The AES31 consists of four parts dedicated to the different aspects of file exchange.

AES31 Part 1 defines the physical transport of data. It deals with the readability of the storage media. Each audio workstation should be able to read the file systems of the various storage media, such as those of hard disk drives, which, after all, contain files from the various audio workstations. These requirements are aimed at the most different storage media and file formats of different lengths.

Part 2 of the AES31 standard deals with the audio file format and the way in which the specified Broadcast Wave Files( BWF) are arranged on the storage media and how they are transported over the network.

To better manage the audio, edit and project data, AES31 Part 3 of the standard specifies the project structure. This is based on the standardized Audio Decision List( ADL), a simple project exchange format through which project states can be exchanged.

AES31 Part 4 is the most demanding part of the AES31 standard, defining an object-oriented project structure and providing considerably more parameters.