DAWPROJECT
Open exchange format for user data between Digital Audio Workstations (DAWs)
Motivation
The DAWPROJECT format provides a (vendor-agnostic) way of transferring user data between different music applications (DAWs).
Currently, the choices available for this task are rather limited. Standard MIDI files can represent note data, but it is often a lower-level representation (no ramps) of data than what the DAW uses internally, which forces consolidation on export. AAF only covers audio and doesn't have any concept of musical-time, which limits it to post-audio workflows. Most plug-ins do allow you to save presets to a shared location, but this has to be done for each instance. What most users end up doing is just exporting audio as stems.
The aim of this project is to export all that data (audio/note/automation/plug-in) along with the structure surrounding it into a single DAWPROJECT file.
Status
The format is being actively developed and will still undergo structural changes. The aim is to have a stable (1.0) specification of the format in 2023.
Goals
- Package all user data of a project/song into a single file.
- Audio timeline data
- Note timeline data
- Note expression data
- Automation timeline data
- Audio data (embedded or referenced)
- Plug-in states (always embedded)
- The format should be able to preserve as much user created data as feasible.
- The format should be able to express the track and timeline structures of the exporting DAW as is, leaving it up to the importer to use this data and flatten it as needed.
- Simple to implement
- Built upon established open standards
- Language agnostic, no special dependencies
- Open & free
Non-goals
- Being the native file-format for a DAW
- Optimal performance (like a binary format could provide)
- Storing low-level MIDI events directly (but rather relying on higher level abstractions)
- Storing non-session data (view settings, preferences)
Format Specification
-
File Extension: .dawproject
-
Container: ZIP
-
Format: XML (project.xml, metadata.xml)
-
Text encoding: UTF-8
-
The exporting DAW is free to choose the directory structure it wants for media and plug-in files.
Building
Requires Java Runtime version 16 or later.
To build (using Gradle):
./gradlew build
Language Support
DAWPROJECT is based on plain XML/ZIP and can be used with any programming language that can parse those.
The DOM of DAWPROJECT is defined by a set of Java classes which have XML-related annotations and HTML-induced Javadoc comments. Those are used (via reflection) to generate XML Documentation and Schemas. Potentially, the same approach could be used to generate code for other languages (contributions welcome).
Example project
The exporting application is free to structure tracks and timelines in a way that fits its internal model. The choice is left to the importing application to either use the level of structure provided (if applicable) or to flatten/convert it to match its model.
As an example, here's the project.xml of a simple file saved in Bitwig Studio 5.0 with one instrument track and one audio track. As the audio clips in Bitwig Studio are themselves a timeline of audio events, you will notice that there are two levels of elements, id25 representing the clip timeline on the arrangement, and id26 representing the audio events inside the clip.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<Project version="0.1">
<Application name="Bitwig Studio" version="5.0"/>
<Transport>
<Tempo max="666.000000" min="20.000000" unit="bpm" value="149.000000" id="id0" name="Tempo"/>
<TimeSignature denominator="4" numerator="4" id="id1"/>
</Transport>
<Structure>
<Track contentType="notes" loaded="true" id="id2" name="Bass" color="#a2eabf">
<Channel audioChannels="2" destination="id15" role="regular" solo="false" id="id3">
<Devices>
<ClapPlugin deviceID="org.surge-synth-team.surge-xt" deviceName="Surge XT" deviceRole="instrument" loaded="true" id="id7" name="Surge XT">
<Parameters/>
<Enabled value="true" id="id8" name="On/Off"/>
<State path="plugins/d19b1f6e-bbb6-42fe-a6c9-54b41d97a05d.clap-preset"/>
</ClapPlugin>
</Devices>
<Mute value="false" id="id6" name="Mute"/>
<Pan max="1.000000" min="0.000000" unit="normalized" value="0.500000" id="id5" name="Pan"/>
<Volume max="2.000000" min="0.000000" unit="linear" value="0.659140" id="id4" name="Volume"/>
</Channel>
</Track>
<Track contentType="audio" loaded="true" id="id9" name="Drumloop" color="#b53bba">
<Channel audioChannels="2" destination="id15" role="regular" solo="false" id="id10">
<Mute value="false" id="id13" name="Mute"/>
<Pan max="1.000000" min="0.000000" unit="normalized" value="0.500000" id="id12" name="Pan"/>
<Volume max="2.000000" min="0.000000" unit="linear" value="0.177125" id="id11" name="Volume"/>
</Channel>
</Track>
<Track contentType="audio notes" loaded="true" id="id14" name="Master">
<Channel audioChannels="2" role="master" solo="false" id="id15">
<Mute value="false" id="id18" name="Mute"/>
<Pan max="1.000000" min="0.000000" unit="normalized" value="0.500000" id="id17" name="Pan"/>
<Volume max="2.000000" min="0.000000" unit="linear" value="1.000000" id="id16" name="Volume"/>
</Channel>
</Track>
</Structure>
<Arrangement id="id19">
<Lanes timeUnit="beats" id="id20">
<Lanes track="id2" id="id21">
<Clips id="id22">
<Clip time="0.0" duration="8.0" playStart="0.0">
<Notes id="id23">
<Note time="0.000000" duration="0.250000" channel="0" key="65" vel="0.787402" rel="0.787402"/>
<Note time="1.000000" duration="0.250000" channel="0" key="65" vel="0.787402" rel="0.787402"/>
<Note time="4.000000" duration="0.250000" channel="0" key="65" vel="0.787402" rel="0.787402"/>
<Note time="5.000000" duration="0.250000" channel="0" key="65" vel="0.787402" rel="0.787402"/>
<Note time="0.500000" duration="0.250000" channel="0" key="64" vel="0.787402" rel="0.787402"/>
<Note time="4.500000" duration="0.250000" channel="0" key="64" vel="0.787402" rel="0.787402"/>
<Note time="1.500000" duration="2.500000" channel="0" key="53" vel="0.787402" rel="0.787402"/>
<Note time="5.500000" duration="0.250000" channel="0" key="53" vel="0.787402" rel="0.787402"/>
<Note time="6.000000" duration="2.000000" channel="0" key="53" vel="0.787402" rel="0.787402"/>
</Notes>
</Clip>
</Clips>
</Lanes>
<Lanes track="id9" id="id24">
<Clips id="id25">
<Clip time="0.0" duration="8.00003433227539" playStart="0.0" loopStart="0.0" loopEnd="8.00003433227539" fadeTimeUnit="beats" fadeInTime="0.0" fadeOutTime="0.0" name="Drumfunk3 170bpm">
<Clips id="id26">
<Clip time="0.0" duration="8.00003433227539" contentTimeUnit="beats" playStart="0.0" fadeTimeUnit="beats" fadeInTime="0.0" fadeOutTime="0.0">
<Warps contentTimeUnit="seconds" timeUnit="beats" id="id28">
<Audio algorithm="stretch" channels="2" duration="2.823541666666667" sampleRate="48000" id="id27">
<File path="audio/Drumfunk3 170bpm.wav"/>
</Audio>
<Warp time="0.0" contentTime="0.0"/>
<Warp time="8.00003433227539" contentTime="2.823541666666667"/>
</Warps>
</Clip>
</Clips>
</Clip>
</Clips>
</Lanes>
<Lanes track="id14" id="id29">
<Clips id="id30"/>
</Lanes>
</Lanes>
</Arrangement>
<Scenes/>
</Project>DAW Support
Enable experimental support in Bitwig Studio (4.0 or later)
Create a file named config.json with the following content inside you user settings directory.
dawproject : true
The user settings directory is different on each platform
- Windows: %LOCALAPPDATA%/Bitwig Studio
- Mac: Library/Application Support/Bitwig/Bitwig Studio
- Linux: ~/.BitwigStudio
This will add an "Export Project..." entry in the FILE menu and allow DAWPROJECT files to be opened.