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NIFF
NIFF is the first standard code for musical
notation. NIFF is based on RIFF.
A minor revision,NIFF 6b, is available as of June, 2002. This revision is
provided by Jeff Thompson, author of
Niffty.
The History of NIFF
The NIFF (Notation Interchange File Format) was completed in the fall of
1995. This is a standard digital format for the representation of standard
musical notation. The format is very flexible, allowing for simple implementations
with minimal graphical information, or much more elaborate descriptions
including all aspects of page layout, associated midi data, custom symbols,
etc.
Sponsored by Passport Designs, Mark of the Unicorn, Musicware, Opcode
Systems, and Cakewalk Music Software, the format was designed as a cooperative
effort. The members of the team which developed NIFF are listed below.
Please note that some of the affiliations listed have changed since NIFF
was written.
-
Dave Abrahams, Mark of the Unicorn
-
Gary Barber, Musicware
-
Raymond Bily, Midisoft Corporation
-
Mike Brockman, Musicware
-
Mark Burton, Blue Ribbon Software
-
Don Byrd, Advanced Music Notation Systems, Musicware
-
Cakewalk Music Software
-
Nicholas Carter, University of Surrey
-
John Cerullo, Hal Leonard Corporation
-
Daniel Dorff, Theodore Presser
-
John Forbes, Boosey & Hawkes
-
Tom Hall, A-R Editions
-
William Holab, G. Schirmer
-
Wladek Homenda, Musitek
-
Tom Johns, Hal Leonard Corporation
-
Paul Keister, Passport Designs
-
Steve Keller
-
Dave Kusek
-
Lowell Levinger, Passport Designs
-
Bill McCann, Dancing Dots Braille Music Technology
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Severo Ornstein, Woodside, California
-
Mike Ost, Passport Designs
-
Norman Reid, San Francisco, California
-
Robert Schuneman, E. C. Schirmer
-
Dave Scoggin, Opcode Systems
-
Leland Smith, San Andreas Press
-
Eleanor Selfridge-Field, Center for Computer Assisted Research in the Humanities
-
Mark Walsen, Notation Software, Inc.
-
Don Williams, Opcode Systems
Technical Coordinator: Cindy Grande, Grande Software
Administrative Coordinator: Chris Newell, Musitek
Special Advisor: Alan Belkin, University of Montreal
The NIFF SDK Archive
NIFF is not maintained any more. The NIFF SDK Archive is presented as a
mature work for educational usage.
The NIFF SDK is complete. It is a free, public domain, platform independent
Software Developer's Kit for software developers implementing NIFF. It
is a collection of software libraries and tools to support reading, writing,
and navigating NIFF files. Documentation, sample code, and a simple NIFF
file is included. The NIFF SDK makes it possible for a software developer
to add NIFF reading and writing capabilities to an existing program without
writing the housekeeping functions that would otherwise be required. The
software is supplied in source code format in the C programming language.
NIFF Downloads
The following documents are available for download here:
N.B.: Information about these files:
-
The files beginning with "EX" are TIFF (a standard graphics format) formatted
music example files to be used by NIFF developers.
-
"FILEWALK.ZIP" is a Microsoft utility for browsing RIFF files. It parses
the STRUCTURE of a RIFF file. Because NIFF uses tags instead of nested
lists, it is of limited utility.
-
"NIFF 6x.x" is the current version of the specification itself, in html
format. The document "NIFFspec.egs.jpg" contains the musical examples
in the NIFF spec, since some versions of Word have difficulty displaying
these images.
-
"NIFF6x.xchanges.txt" details all the latest changes made to the spec since
v.6a.
-
"niff.h" is a C header file.
-
"MS_NIFF.ZIP" contains some examples of NIFF files written by Midiscan.
-
The files containing "niffsdk" refer to the NIFF software development kit.
-
The files containing "NIFFDUM" provide an updated version of the NIFFDUMPER
UTILITY. See "NIFFDUM.README.TXT".
For those who implement a NIFF importer: There is a
flaw in some example files of the NIFF SDK. There
are 7 undefined shapes in rests with the length 3/16
in AFTER.NIF, 3 in WAYITIS.NIF and 1 in MANDOL.NIF.
Thanks to Cris Sion of
Sionsoft
for confirming this.
See also the NIFF SDK User's Guide
Programs exporting NIFF:
SmartScore Professional Edition - Precision music scanning & world-class scoring. |
Windows, Mac OS X
SmartScore Professional Edition - Precision music scanning & world-class scoring. imports ExtendedNotationFormat
|
SmartScore Songbook Edition - Limit: 3 staves |
Windows, Mac OS X 10.4
SmartScore Songbook Edition - Limit: 3 staves imports ExtendedNotationFormat
|
SmartScore Piano Edition - Limits: 2 staves / no text or lyrics / no TAB or percussion. |
Windows, Mac OS X 10.4
SmartScore Piano Edition - Limits: 2 staves / no text or lyrics / no TAB or percussion. imports ExtendedNotationFormat
|
SmartScore Guitar Edition - Limits: 1 staff / No text or lyrics / no TAB or percussion. |
Windows, Mac OS X 10.4
SmartScore Guitar Edition - Limits: 1 staff / No text or lyrics / no TAB or percussion. imports ExtendedNotationFormat
|
PhotoScore Ultimate |
Windows, MacOS X
PhotoScore Ultimate imports PhotoScoreFormat
|
AudioScore - music to score and music notation |
Windows
AudioScore - music to score and music notation imports PhotoScoreFormat
|
visiv SharpEye Music Reader |
Windows, RISC OS
visiv SharpEye Music Reader imports Liszt
|
Lime Music Notation Software |
Windows, Mac OS 7 through 9.x, Mac OS X
Lime Music Notation Software imports MusicXML, Tilia, NIFF, MIDI
|
Neume - Software For Music Education |
Python, Linux, Mac OS X
Neume - Software For Music Education imports NIFF
|
DixShtix - Java Music Library |
Java
DixShtix - Java Music Library imports NIFF, SMDL, MIDI
|
Vivaldi Scan - Music OCR Software |
Windows
|
Programs importing NIFF:
Sibelius - music notation software |
Windows, Mac OS 8, Mac OS 9, Mac OS X
Sibelius - music notation software exports SibeliusFormat
|
Lime Music Notation Software |
Windows, Mac OS 7 through 9.x, Mac OS X
Lime Music Notation Software exports MusicXML, Tilia, NIFF, MIDI
|
Neume - Software For Music Education |
Python, Linux, Mac OS X
Neume - Software For Music Education exports NIFF
|
DixShtix - Java Music Library |
Java
DixShtix - Java Music Library exports NIFF, SMDL, MIDI
|
Personal Composer - music notation, MIDI, sequencing |
Windows
Personal Composer - music notation, MIDI, sequencing exports MIDI
|
Mozart - music notation software |
Windows
Mozart - music notation software exports MIDI
|
QuickScore Elite - Music Composition and Notation Software |
Windows
QuickScore Elite - Music Composition and Notation Software exports MusicXML, GUIDO, QuickScoreEliteFormat, CopyistFormat, MusicWriteFormat, WAV, MP3
|
TablEdit - Tablatures editor and standard notation editor |
Win16, Win32
TablEdit - Tablatures editor and standard notation editor exports MusicXML, TablEditFormat, RMTF
|
Igor engraver for music notation |
Mac OS 8.5 or later (not Mac OS X), Windows, Wine, LISP
|
TaBazar - a notation program for fretted instruments (like guitar, bass, banjo or mandolin) and percussion |
Windows
TaBazar - a notation program for fretted instruments (like guitar, bass, banjo or mandolin) and percussion exports MusicXML, RMTF
|
Toccata Braille Music Transcription Program |
Windows
|
Niffty - NIFF viewer Applet |
Java Applet
|
|
Windows
|
|
Feedback (questions, suggestions, broken links): NIFF