The Codec

The codec defines the translation rules applied to produce a .life file. It must be fully specified within the file itself. A LIFE parser must be able to reverse the translation using only the codec object and the preamble.

Required fields

Field	Type	Description
type	string	"harmonic_ratio" in v1.0
source_medium	string	One of: "acoustic", "electromagnetic", "spectral", "synthetic"
target_medium	string	One of: "acoustic", "electromagnetic"
scaling_constant	integer	Must match preamble.scaling.value
scaling_expression	string	Must match preamble.scaling.constant
frequency_representation	string	Must be "ratio" in v1.0
reference_frequency_hz	float	Must match preamble.reference.frequency_hz
mappings	object	Explicit declaration of source to target property mappings
reversible	boolean	Whether the file can be decoded back to its source medium
lossless	boolean	Whether all source frequency information is preserved

The mappings object

Mappings must be explicit and human-readable. They serve as documentation for future parsers and as a verification layer for current ones.

"mappings": {
  "pitch":    "frequency_ratio -> wavelength_nm",
  "velocity": "intensity_0_to_1 -> photon_flux_relative",
  "duration": "seconds -> seconds",
  "channel":  "voice_index -> light_source_index"
}

The reversible and lossless flags

These are explicit promises made by the file about its own contents. A conformant parser must honour them.

A file marked reversible: true must be decodable back to its source medium without ambiguity. A file marked lossless: true must contain all source frequency information - nothing discarded during encoding.

Example

"codec": {
  "type":                     "harmonic_ratio",
  "source_medium":            "acoustic",
  "target_medium":            "electromagnetic",
  "scaling_constant":         1099511627776,
  "scaling_expression":       "2^40",
  "frequency_representation": "ratio",
  "reference_frequency_hz":   440.0,
  "mappings": {
    "pitch":    "frequency_ratio -> wavelength_nm",
    "velocity": "intensity_0_to_1 -> photon_flux_relative",
    "duration": "seconds -> seconds",
    "channel":  "voice_index -> light_source_index"
  },
  "reversible": true,
  "lossless":   true
}