Synthetic musicsmaf-yamaha.com spells it Synthetic music Mobile Application Format, with the word "music" not capitalized so it does not participate in the abbreviation SMAF. Mobile Application Format, abbreviated SMAF, is a music data format specified by Yamaha for portable electronic devices, such as

cell phones A mobile phone or cell phone is a portable telephone that allows users to make and receive Telephone call, calls over a radio frequency link while moving within a designated telephone service area, unlike fixed-location phones (landline phone ...

and PDAs. The file extension for SMAF is .MMF and is common as

ringtones A ringtone is the sound made by a telephone to indicate an incoming telephone call. Originally referring to the sound of electromechanical striking of bells or gongs, the term refers to any sound by any device alerting of an incoming call. On p ...

for mobile phones with one of five sound chips. SMAF resembles

MIDI Musical Instrument Digital Interface (; MIDI) is an American-Japanese technical standard that describes a communication protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, ...

, but also supports graphics and

PCM Pulse-code modulation (PCM) is a method used to Digital signal (signal processing), digitally represent analog signals. It is the standard form of digital audio in computers, compact discs, digital telephony and other digital audio application ...

sound playback. Its MIDI playback is produced via

FM synthesis Frequency modulation synthesis (or FM synthesis) is a form of sound synthesis whereby the frequency of a waveform is changed by modulating its frequency with a modulator. The (instantaneous) frequency of an oscillator is altered in accordance wi ...

or PCM

sample-based synthesis Sample-based synthesis is a form of audio synthesis that can be contrasted to either subtractive synthesis or additive synthesis. The principal difference with sample-based synthesis is that the seed waveforms are sampled sounds or instrument ...

, where instrument data (parameters and/or PCM samples) is stored within the .MMF file itself, similar to

module file Module file (MOD music, tracker music) is a family of music file formats originating from the MOD file format on Amiga systems used in the late 1980s. Those who produce these files (using the software called music trackers) and listen to them ...

s. This enables users to create custom instruments, which will sound exactly the same on devices with the same chip. The feature set used in SMAF files usually orients itself at the chips produced by Yamaha for playback:

External links

Yamaha's SMAF Website
{{tech-stub Music notation file formats