Ring Tone Transfer Language

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RTTTL stands for Ring Tone Text Transfer Language. It was developed by Nokia to be used to transfer cellphone ringtones.

The RTTTL format is a string divided into three sections: name, default value, and data.

The name section consists of a string describing the name of the ringtone. This can be no longer than 10 characters, and cannot contain a ":" character.

The default value section is a set of values separated by commas, each containing a key and a value separated by an = character, which describes certain defaults which should be adhered to during the execution of the ringtone. Possible names are

• d - Duration
• b - Beat / Tempo
• o - Octave

The data section consists of a character string containing a duration, pitch, octave and optional dotting (which increases the duration of the note by one half).

Durations

Standard musical durations are denoted by the following notations:

• 1 - Whole note
• 2 - Half note
• 4 - Quarter note
• 8 - Eighth note
• 16 - Sixteenth note
• 32 - Thirty-second note

Dotted rhythmic patterns can be formed by appending a period (".") character to the end of a duration/beat/octave element.

Pitch

• P - Rest or pause
• A - A
• A# - A# / Bb
• H - B / Cb
• C - C
• C# - C# / Db
• D - D
• D# - D# / Eb
• E - E / Fb
• F - F / E#
• F# - F# / Gb
• G - G
• G# - G# / Ab

Octave

The RTTTL format allows octaves starting from the A below middle C and going up four octaves. This corresponds with the inability of cellphones to reproduce certain tones audibly. These octaves are numbered from lowest pitch to highest pitch from 5 to 8.

The octave should be left out of the notation in the case of a rest or pause in the pattern.

Example

An example of the RTTL format would be

fifth:d=4,o=5,b=63:8P,8G5,8G5,8G5,2D#5