Talk:Smaart

Corrections and Stylistic Revisions

This article contains outdated information and a few other factual errors about Smaart and its history. I disclose that I happen to know this because I am a partner in Rational Acoustics, the current owner and developer of Smaart, and I have been involved in its development for nearly 20 years.

In addition to factual corrections, I wanted to offer a few stylistic suggestions that I think would improve the presentation and overall readability of the article. I am given to understand, that in light of my vested interest in this topic, the much-preferred approach would be to propose my corrections on the Talk page first, rather than diving right in and making changed myself, in hopes that some other editor might revise the article. So here goes.

Top Section

Corrections:

• No version of Smaart, Smaart Pro or SmaartLive has ever included MLS measurement capability. (Acoustic Tools did have a limited MLS/FHT measurement capability but the white spectrum of the test signal and AT's lack of a pinking filter limited its usefulness for acoustical measurement.) References to MLS should be removed.
• The part about Smaart having three modes is outdated. Beginning in version 6 (2006), transfer function and spectral data can be displayed simultaneously in Smaart -- they are no longer modal. We now refer to Smaart's two operating modes as "real-time" and "impulse response".
• Smaart is routinely used by audio engineers to optimize linearity of all types of sound systems, primarily during installation and setup. It is true however that Smaart finds wide application in managing the performance of sound reinforcement systems during live events as well, and that this capability is a notable advantage of dual-channel transfer function analyzers.
• There is a typo in spelling out the SMAART acronym.
• Apple now calls their Macintosh operating system simply "OS X"
• Smaart v.7 was originally released in 2010, not 2011

Sylistic/Presentational Suggestions

This section could benefit from a little rearranging for style and order of presentation IMO, breaking up long sentences and groping related ideas together in separated paragraphs. In the proposed revision below, I have also tried to tone down the presentation and make it a little more matter-of-fact, and provide a few more authoritative references.

Proposed Revision

Smaart is an audio and acoustical measurement and analysis software application published by Rational Acoustics. Originally developed in the mid-1990s by SIA Software Company and marketed by JBL Professional as JBL-Smaart,[1] it is commonly used in the fields of sound system engineering and acoustics.[2]

Sound engineers use Smaart to optimize the linearity of sound systems during installation and setup. It is also used to monitor the stability and linearity of sound reinforcement systems during live events. The latter is made possible through the use of a stimulus-independent, dual-channel transfer function measurement technique that works with wide variety of signals including music,[3] unlike measurement techniques requiring specific stimulus signals such as pseudorandom noise and sinusoidal sweeps[Handbook of Signal Processing in Acoustics, Pp 66-79 : https://books.google.com/books?id=YaNCAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA66#v=onepage&q&f=false][ISO 18233, Acoustics — Application of new measurement methods in building and room acoustics] that would be inappropriate for use during a performance.

Smaart has two basic operating modes: real-time and impulse response.[4] In real-time mode, the program can perform real-time spectrum analysis (RTA and spectrograph) and dual-channel transfer function analysis of the frequency response of sound systems and components such as loudspeakers and audio amplifiers. Impulse response mode is geared toward acoustical impulse response measurement and calculation of common room acoustics parameters and speech intelligibility metrics based on the impulse response data.[5]

The name "SMAART" is an acronym for Sound Measurement Acoustical Analysis Real-time Tool.[6] Over the years since its introduction, real-time measurement and analysis products bearing this name have included JBL-Smaart, JBL-Smaart Pro, SIA-Smaart Pro, SmaartLive and simply Smaart. Another variant aimed at file-based acoustical impulse response analysis has been offered as Smaart Acoustic Tools. These have been published under several different company names but actually represent the work of a relatively small group of people (see History [bookmark]).

Smaart was originally written as a native Windows 3.1 application.[7] It remained a Windows-only product until 2006, when EAW published Smaart 6 for both Microsoft Windows and Apple's OS X operating system.[8] As of 2010, Smaart was in its 7th major revision.[9]

"Use" Section, Paragraph 1

Corrections:

• Smaart has no MLS measurement capability.

Sylistic/Presentational Suggestions

• The first paragraph seems to pile up a lot of terminology with little explanation.
• I am not sure that the reference to Smaart's MTW transfer function is appropriate within Wikipedia's guidelines. Unlike the conventional dual-FFT transfer function, whose virtues are widely known and accepted, MTW is proprietary to Smaart. The citation supporting its benefits is a dead link and I don't know of another published source to back that up.

Proposed Revision

Most measurements in Smaart are based on the fast Fourier transform (FFT). In RTA and real-time Spectrograph measurements, a single stream of audio data is transformed into the frequency domain by a continuous series of FFTs and the results are processed and displayed in various ways. The real-time transfer function compares the FFTs of two signal streams — a signal going into a system and the signal that comes out — to produce a measurement of the system’s magnitude and phase response by frequency.[10] Taking the inverse Fourier transform (IFT) of the frequency-domain transfer function yields the impulse response of the system under test.[11]

Version History, Third Bullet Point

Correction:

• Smaart version 2 was released in 1997 and was called JBL-Smaart Pro.

http://web.archive.org/web/20041014193549/http://www.siasoft.com/about/

Calvert (talk) 22:02, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia, Calvert. I will work on your suggested changes shortly. Binksternet (talk) 01:33, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Thanks very much, Binksternet. I actually had one more suggestion regarding the section on impulse responses. I was a little trepidatious about adding new material though, so I thought I would just start with what's there and take it a step at a time. I'm also leery of citing our own web site given the COI guidelines and the flag on the article... I'll post my suggestions below and maybe you can could have a look at that as well? Thanks again for your help. Calvert (talk) 16:18, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

"Use" Section, Subheading: Impulse Response

Observations:

• Kind of a nit-picky point but Smaart can't find the delay between just any two signals. It has to be two instances the same signal, typically traveling by two different paths (e.g., an electronic path and an acoustical path), resulting in a time offset between them. One cannot, for example, feed two loudspeakers with two different noise generators and expect to find the delay between them.
• This section actually leaves out most of the ways that impulse responses are used in Smaart. Finding delay times is important of course, but delays are really the tip of the IR iceberg at this point. I'm really not looking to hype Smaart's impulse response capability but some mention of IR mode seems relevant in this context.

Proposed Revision

In real-time mode, Smaart's "Delay Locator" is used to find the delay time between two instances of a signal traveling by two different paths; for example, an electronic path and an acoustical path. The software calculates the transfer function and then the impulse response of two continuous audio signals, finding the similarities in the signals and elapsed time between their relative arrivals. This information can be used to set delay times for delay towers in large outdoor sound systems and for other subsystems and loudspeaker zones.[existing citation] Veteran Van Halen touring sound engineer Jim Yakabuski calls such delay locator programs as Smaart a "must have" item,[existing citation] useful for quickly aligning sound system elements when setup time is limited.[existing citation]

In impulse response (IR) mode, Smaart will record acoustical impulse response measurements of up to several seconds in length and calculate common acoustical parameters such as reverberation time and early-to-late energy ratios. Users can also analyze frequency content and calculate speech intelligibility metrics such as Speech Transmission Index (STI) from IR data. Impulse responses can be measured indirectly, using the dual-channel transfer function/IFT method, or the response of an acoustical system to an impulsive stimulus such as a pistol shot or balloon pop can simply be recorded and displayed. Impulse response data from other sources stored in standard .wav or .aiff audio formats can be analyzed in IR mode as well.[Handbook for Sound Engineers, Pp 1616-1624 : https://books.google.com/books?id=t__vBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA1616#v=onepage&q&f=false][12]

Calvert (talk) 16:40, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Okay, cool. I'm just waiting until my concentration is fully available for the editing work – waiting for my multi-day gig to conclude. Binksternet (talk) 17:18, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Thanks again. Very much appreciated. Calvert (talk) 17:27, 19 May 2015 (UTC)