my predicament is that i transcribe wave files i download them from a
secure
website to my machine and transcribe them - wave files are taking me
20
minutes for a 3 minute voice file to download.  this means i can only
transcribe a maximum of 9 minutes of files per hour!  i would lose my
clients if that is going to be the case.  i am starting work for an
Australian client next week and their files are up to a maximum of 7
minutes
each.  i have a 56kbs modem and did a trial yesterday.

the Australian firm used to compress the files before sending them to
our
website, now i have to download them straight off their website and
they
will not be compressed.  Do any of your clued up technicians have any
idea
how i could get a program which will take the files off the Australian
website, put them onto my business website compress them and then let
me
access the compressed files using my modem adsl is not available in my
area and i am stuck with a modem

---

Request for Question Clarification by poe-ga on 25 Jun 2003 02:16 PDT

Hi Paulette,

If I understand your question correctly, you may be out of luck. There
is logically no way in you can compress a file without downloading it
first. The only way round this is for the company you're downloading
from to convert it beforehand.

If they are willing to do this, as it seems one company already has, I
would heartily recommend a free audio conversion tool called
dBpowerAMP by Illustrate Software which enables conversion between
many formats.

dBpowerAMP
http://www.dBpowerAMP.com/

While the company you're downloading from would have to convert the
files first, this is easy using dBpowerAMP. Simply right click on the
appropriate file and choose Convert To. This should keep the process
as quick and painless as possible.

Your other decision will be as to which format to use. Without knowing
what data you're dealing with, I can't really recommend a particular
format. However you can browse the codec page at dBpowerAMP to see
which formats they support. Each codec is a single file that, when
installed, adds itself to the choice of formats to convert to on right
clicking a file.

dBpowerAMP Codec Central
http://www.dbpoweramp.com/codec-central.htm

If loss of quality is acceptable, you could use the standard mp3 or
Windows Media formats that everyone knows, or Ogg Vorbis which tends
to be the choice of audiophiles.

If you can't lose any quality whatsoever, or you wish to restore the
file to a wave file after downloading it, there are lossless formats
such as FLAC. Lossless means that the file will be compressed without
losing any quality whatsoever. You'll find that the file will remain
far larger after compression than if you used a lossy format, though
still smaller than your original wave files.

Would this be acceptable to post as an official answer? If not, please
feel free to ask for further details.

Poe

Even there exists technology that allows ISP to compress files on the
fly, it does not appear to support binary files, e.g., WAV.
(http://www.netzero.net/popup/learnmore-hispeedfaqpop.html)

I was wondering if there are web sites offering intermediate storage
that you can instruct downloads and store them compressed so you can
get them compressed from the intermediate means.  But then, your case
involves secured web site as source.  So, it isn't an viable solution
even if such services exist.

Have you thought of asking a trusted friend of yours who has access to
broadband to get and compress the files and then e-mail them to you?

I believe an important point in the original question is being missed.
paulettej-ga mentioned the possibility of having the files downloaded
directly to her web site from the other company's web site,
compressing
them on her web server, and *then* downloading them to her own
computer.
She has made the important observation that her web site's connection
to the other company's site is almost certainly much faster than her
modem at home. She's right, this is possible. 
<p>
paulettej-ga, if your web server is running Linux and you have
ssh access or at least the privilege of running your own CGI programs,
it is certainly possible for your server to fetch .wav files from
another web site and then compress them using various open source
tools
which are also available on Windows so that you can play the files
back
when you receive them.
<p>
I can't design such a program for you for $2, but yes, it is certainly
possible. The more we know about your web server (Linux? NT? CGI
programming access available? ssh access available? gcc compiler
available?), the more we can help.

Thanks, Major Tom.

Oops, I hadn't looked at that angle. Certainly there are command line
tools to compress audio files into mp3 format, because I've used them.
Writing a cgi program to automate the process is beyond my knowledge,
however, let alone the two bucks. I would guess that it would need to
be custom written.

Re-reading the question again, I wonder what the turnaround time has
to be for these transcriptions. Perhaps it would be possible to
download a bunch of wave files overnight and work on them during the
day.

Poe