fre:ac version 1.1 CVS

fre:ac is a free and open source audio converter for various formats.
It supports audio CD ripping, tag editing and video downloads and converts
the following audio formats:

	- MP3
		- using the LAME MP3 encoder		(http://lame.sourceforge.net/)
		- using the mpg123 decoder		(http://www.mpg123.de/)
		- using the MAD MP3 decoder		(http://www.underbit.com/)

	- MP4/M4A AAC
		- using the Core Audio AAC encoder	(http://www.apple.com/)
		- using the FAAC/FAAD2 codec		(http://www.audiocoding.com/)

	- Windows Media Audio				(http://www.microsoft.com/)

	- Xiph Foundation codecs
		- Opus					(http://www.opus-codec.org/)
		- Vorbis				(http://www.vorbis.com/)
		- Speex					(http://www.speex.org/)
		- FLAC					(http://flac.sourceforge.net/)

	- Apple Lossless (ALAC)
		- using the Core Audio ALAC encoder	(http://www.apple.com/)
		- using the libav ALAC encoder		(http://www.libav.org/)
		- using David Hammerton's ALAC decoder	(http://www.craz.net/)

	- Musepack					(http://www.musepack.net/)
	- WavPack					(http://www.wavpack.com/)
	- OptimFROG					(http://www.losslessaudio.org/)
	- Monkey's Audio				(http://www.monkeysaudio.com/)
	- TAK						(http://www.thbeck.de/)

	- various other formats
		- using the libsndfile library		(http://www.mega-nerd.com/)
		- using the libav codec library		(http://www.libav.org/)

Further codecs (e.g. Nero's HE-AAC encoder) can be used as external
plug-ins (see the manual for installation instructions).

fre:ac uses the CDRip library for audio ripping on Windows.
fre:ac uses the cdio library for audio ripping on macOS, Linux, Solaris, FreeBSD and NetBSD.
fre:ac uses the cdparanoia library for audio ripping on Linux, FreeBSD and OpenBSD.

Code from FAAD2 is Copyright (c) Nero AG, www.nero.com

Installation
------------

	fre:ac is distributed in two variants, an .exe file containing a setup wizard or alternatively
	a .zip archive that contains just the application without an installer.

	If you downloaded the .exe installer, simply run it and the setup wizard will guide you through
	the installation process creating start menu icons that will run fre:ac.

	If you downloaded the .zip package, please extract/move the contents to a location of your
	choice and run freac.exe to start fre:ac.

Requirements
------------

	Requirements for running fre:ac:

		Supported operating systems:
			- Windows XP/Vista/7/8.x/10
			- macOS 10.5 Leopard or later
			- Linux (most modern distributions should work)
			- FreeBSD/PC-BSD (tested on FreeBSD 10.0)
			- NetBSD (tested on NetBSD 6.0, NetBSD 5.x and earlier releases are not supported)
			- OpenBSD (tested on OpenBSD 5.3)
			- Solaris (tested on Solaris 11)
			- GNU Hurd (tested on Debian Sid)
			- Haiku (tested on Haiku x86 GCC 5 Nightly)

		Minimum hardware requirements:
			- Intel Pentium 4, AMD Athlon 64, PowerPC G4 or ARMv5 CPU
			- 512 MB RAM
			- 100 MB free disk space

		Recommended hardware specs:
			- Intel Core i3 or AMD Phenom II CPU
			- 1 GB RAM
			- 1 GB free disk space

	Additional requirements for compiling the sources:

		All platforms:

			- smooth v0.8.73.0 CVS (http://www.smooth-project.org/)

		Windows:

			- MinGW GCC v4.0+ (http://www.mingw.org/) or Visual Studio 2015

		All Linux and Unix platforms:

			- GCC v4.0+

			- libbz2, libcairo, libfaac, libfaad2, libjpeg, libmp3lame, libmp4v2, libmpg123,
			  libogg, libopus, libpng, libspeex, libvorbis, libx11, libxml2, libXmu

			Linux:

				- libasound2, libcdio, libcdio-paranoia, libgtk2, libudev

			Solaris:

				- audio headers

	Additional optional software:

		- The 32 bit version for Windows can use Winamp plug-ins if they are present in the 'plugins' directory.

		- Several external codecs can be used with fre:ac. Please see the manual for more details.

Known problems
--------------

	All platforms:

		- There are the following restrictions on the input file format:

			- FAAC, FDK AAC, VisualOn AAC:
				- audio must be at 8, 11.025, 12, 16, 22.05, 24, 32, 44.1, 48, 64, 88.2 or 96 kHz
			- LAME:
				- audio must be at 8, 11.025, 12, 16, 22.05, 24, 32, 44.1 or 48 kHz,
				  can be converted by LAME

		- Resampling is only supported with LAME. Input files must be at the desired output
		  sampling rate unless you are encoding with LAME.

	Linux and Unix specific problems:

		- There are no application packages for fre:ac yet, so you need to install dependencies manually for now.
		  Please just extract the contents of the archive to your home directory.

History
-------

	Version 1.1 CVS (July 2017)

		- renamed project to fre:ac - free audio converter
		- ported to Linux, macOS, Solaris, FreeBSD, OpenBSD and NetBSD
		- added Estonian, Croatian, Portuguese, Bulgarian, Vietnamese, Hebrew, Arabic, Basque, Afrikaans,
		  Cantonese (Hong Kong), Serbian (Cyrillic), Catalan, Valencian and Galician language support
		- added German, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Portuguese, Czech, Greek and Basque user guides
		- added several translations for the installer
		- converted input and output filters to BoCA components
		- implemented new configuration dialog
		- added support for multiple configurations
		- added multi encoder hub component
		- conversions are now done in parallel if possible
		- redesigned progress display area
		- new dialog to confirm overwriting of existing files before conversion
		- allowed format selection from the encode menu for encoders supporting multiple formats
		- completely reworked LAME configuration dialog
		- added support for editing configurations during conversions
		- added support for verifying lossless input and output files
		- added a simple tag editor
		- added video downloader extension
		- added Monkey's Audio encoder/decoder
		- added Speex speech encoder/decoder
		- added Windows Media Audio encoder/decoder
		- added Opus audio encoder/decoder
		- added Core Audio AAC/ALAC encoder
		- added support for command line encoders/decoders
		- added support for the mpg123 MP3 decoder
		- added support for the MAD MP3 decoder
		- added TwinVQ VQF decoder support
		- added support for AAC synchronizing (needed to read ripped AAC streams)
		- added support for the VisualOn AAC encoder
		- added support for the Fraunhofer FDK AAC encoder/decoder
		- added support for reading simple audio files using libsndfile
		- added support for cover art in MP4 files
		- added support for ID3v2, MP4, WMA and Vorbis Comment chapters
		- added support for MCDI frame in ID3v2 tags
		- added support for ID3v1 tags in AAC files
		- added support for gapless MP3 decoding
		- added support for RF64 and Wave64 files
		- added RIFF tagging support (using LIST INFO and Cart chunks)
		- added support for Ogg FLAC files
		- completely reworked arguments of freacmd
		- added support for selecting configuration in freaccmd
		- added support for wildcards in arguments to freaccmd
		- added support for encoding to single file with freaccmd
		- added support for large fonts
		- changed default output directory to "My Music" folder
		- added an option to append sequential numbers to otherwise identical filenames
		- added additional genres as defined by Winamp 5.6
		- added <composer>, <conductor> and <disc> patterns
		- added <directory> pattern to allow preserving existing directory structures
		- added <filetype> pattern
		- added <installdrive> pattern for use in output directory name
		- allow CDDB queries even when no CD drive is present
		- added preview to CDDB match selection dialog
		- added an option to automatically select the first CDDB match
		- added support for CDDB queries using HTTP GET
		- added context menu for text edit fields
		- label/publisher and ISRC information is now preserved during conversion
		- added support for reading ISRC codes from CDs
		- added support for ripping hidden tracks (HTOA)
		- added support for disc drives with drive letters A: and B:
		- added ripping speed configuration option
		- added CD read offset configuration option
		- added configuration option to keep converted tracks in joblist
		- added configuration option to add encoded files to joblist
		- added support for loading cue sheets
		- added support for reading and writing Vorbis files with .oga extension
		- added support for XSPF, Windows Media and PLS playlists
		- added a slider for seeking during playback
		- added a warning when converting from lossy to lossless formats
		- added the ability to sort the joblist by clicking headers
		- added basic multi-channel audio support
		- added support for setting process priority on Windows
		- added a button to open the output folder
		- added support for creating one playlist or cue sheet per album in a single conversion
		- save playlists and cue sheets along with output file in single file mode
		- the time left indicator now shows hours if necessary
		- the five last used output folders are now saved for later use
		- the five last used file name patterns are now saved for later use
		- greatly improved case conversion functions
		- conversion progress is now shown in the taskbar on Windows 7 and later
		- skipping tracks is no longer possible when converting to a single file
		- fixed CJK editor appearing offset in Windows Vista/7/8 default designs
		- fixed ID3v2 cover data not being displayed in iTunes
		- fixed writing of bad ID3v2 tags when iconv.dll is not available
		- fixed ID3lib to read and write correct ID3v2.4 tags
		- fixed writing of ID3v1 tags when encoding VBR or ABR MP3s
		- fixed automatic reading of CD contents on disc insert
		- fixed creation of cue sheets for multiple tracks in a single file
		- fixed total progress bar not working correctly with many tracks in joblist
		- fixed crash when encoding to single MP4 file
		- fixed unwanted downsampling when encoding to low bitrate MP3
		- fixed Vorbis (and FLAC) comment tag reading
		- fixed not writing Xing header when using LAME presets
		- fixed crash when trying to open unsupported Sun Audio (.au) files
		- fixed and improved decoding of raw audio formats WAVE, AIFF and AU
		- fixed failure to delete read-only files with "Delete files after encoding" option
		- fixed last track of CD-Extra discs being two seconds too long
		- fixed encoding empty tracks when no CD is inserted
		- fixed various CDDB issues
		- fixed HTTP proxy authentication
		- fixed freaccmd crashes
		- fixed support for various artists CDs
		- fixed handling of stray tabs in title info
		- improved CDDB data sanity check
		- improved title info editing user friendliness
		- improved metadata extraction from paths
		- improved support for network files and directories
		- raised maximum file name length
		- do not eject discs when user stopped conversion
		- NT SCSI mode is now used by default to access CD drives
		- fixed ASPI error message being displayed on systems without optical drives
		- installer improvements
		- lots of fixes to the command line encoder
		- fixed uninstaller not working when run directly
		- added native x64 platform support
		- upgraded FLAC to version 1.3.2
		- upgraded FAAC to version 1.28
		- upgraded FAAD2 to version 2.7
		- upgraded LAME to version 3.99.5
		- upgraded Vorbis to version 1.3.5 + aoTuV beta 6.03 (2014)
		- upgraded Ogg library to version 1.3.2
		- upgraded CDRip to version 2.2 (with cdparanoia III version 10.2)
		- upgrade to MP4v2 v2.0.0
		- lots of other fixes

Special thanks to
-----------------

	- Paul Francis Harrison for developing the Bonk format
	- Albert L. Faber for his excellent CDRip Ripping Library

	- the translators: Eric Le Carre (French),
			   Marco D'Amato (Italian),
			   REIKA (Japanese),
			   Federico Reddig and Will (Spanish),
			   Jose Maria Vera Somoza (Spanish, Latin American),
			   Nikolaos-Ioannis Galanis (Greek),
			   Evgeny Kozlov (Russian),
			   Henryk Ning and Meng Pang Wang (Chinese, traditional),
			   Joeyong Jen (Chinese, simplified),
			   Michal Trzebiatowski and Darek Rzeznicki (Polish),
			   Peter Toth (Hungarian),
			   Andrij Ilechko (Ukrainian),
			   Wim Garreyn and Thomas De Rocker (Dutch),
			   Nebojša Nikolic (Serbian),
			   Jan Parttimaa (Finnish),
			   Julius Faltus (Czech),
			   Escada (Portuguese, Brazilian),
			   Odyssey (Korean),
			   Jan Arni Jacobsen (Danish),
			   Mikael Hiort af Ornäs and Anton Mjoernebrant (Swedish),
			   Peter Krajcar (Slovak),
			   Andreas Normann Aanonsen (Norwegian),
			   Vincent Rateau (Esperanto),
			   Cako (Turkish),
			   Naglis Jonaitis (Lithuanian),
			   Borca Alin and Laurentiu Bubuianu (Romanian),
			   El libre (Catalan),
			   Agustín Bou (Valencian),
			   Jose Goncalves (Portuguese),
			   Meelis Pasieko (Estonian),
			   Goran Bekic (Croatian),
			   Eduardo Estévez (Galician),
			   Phan Anh (Vietnamese),
			   Ilan Tsmeret (Hebrew),
			   Eman Ali Fhoula (Arabic),
			   Martin Deyanov (Bulgarian),
			   Cois Wiid (Afrikaans),
			   Xabier Aramendi (Basque),
			   Kin Kwok (Cantonese, Hong Kong),
			   Patriccollu di Santa Maria č Sichč (Corsican)

	- Hans-Juergen Bardenhagen for his help and suggestions for the FAAC encoder
	- all the testers and everyone who submitted bug reports

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The official fre:ac homepage: http://www.freac.org/

robert.kausch@freac.org,
Robert Kausch
