SigMF
{{Short description|Open standard for digitized radio signals}}
{{Orphan|date=December 2024}}
{{Infobox file format
| name = SigMF
| icon = SigMF Logo (Colorized).png
| iconcaption =
| icon_size = 160px
| screenshot =
| screenshot_size =
| caption =
|_noextcode =
| extensions = .sigmf, .sigmf-data, .sigmf-meta
|_nomimecode =
| mime =
| type_code =
| uniform_type =
| conforms_to =
| magic =
| developer =
| released = {{start date and age|2017|02|01}}
| latest_release_version = v1.2.3
| latest_release_date = {{start date and age|2024|11|22}}
| genre = time-series
| container_for = Time series Radio Frequency (RF) Signals
| contained_by = JSON
| extended_from =
| extended_to =
| standard =
| free =
| url = {{URL|sigmf.org}}
}}
SigMF is a standard file format for storing and organizing digitized radio frequency (RF) signals and corresponding metadata, supporting time series real or complex-valued signals.{{cite journal |last1=Hilburn |first1=Ben |year=2018 |title=SigMF: The Signal Metadata Format |journal=Proceedings of the GNU Radio Conference |volume=3 |issue=1|url=https://pubs.gnuradio.org/index.php/grcon/article/view/52}}{{Cite web |title=IQ Files and SigMF — PySDR: A Guide to SDR and DSP using Python |url=https://pysdr.org/content/iq_files.html#sigmf-and-annotating-iq-files |access-date=2024-06-28 |website=pysdr.org}} A single SigMF "Recording" consists of two files: 1) a binary file containing only the time series digitized samples, and 2) a metadata file describing the contents and capture details of those samples. The metadata is encapsulated in a JSON file with a .sigmf-meta extension, situated alongside the binary data stored in a file with a .sigmf-data extension.{{Cite web |title=IQEngine |url=https://www.iqengine.org/sigmf |access-date=2024-06-28 |website=www.iqengine.org}} SigMF "Extensions" enable the addition of hierarchical data to a complete dataset, a capture, or a specific region of the recording. Common applications of SigMF recordings include capturing wireless communications signals, radar, GNSS and electronic warfare.
History
Before the standardization of SigMF, time series data representing radio signals were commonly stored in flat binary files with external descriptors. Occasionally, researchers used Hierarchical Data Format (HDF5) containers (.hdf5), but these containers lack specificity to any data type. The VITA Radio Transport Standard {{aka}} VITA 49 (.vrt) was at times employed for RF data storage, although it is primarily designed as a transport format for RF signals rather than for data storage purposes.{{cite journal |doi=10.1109/MCAS.2012.2221520 |url = https://www.vita.com/resources/Documents/Articles/IEEE%20CAS%20Mag%202012.pdf |access-date = October 10, 2023 |title = The VITA 49 Analog RF-Digital Interface |date = 2012 |last1 = Cooklev |first1 = Todor |last2 = Normoyle |first2 = Robert |last3 = Clendenen |first3 = David |journal = IEEE Circuits and Systems Magazine |volume = 12 |issue = 4 |pages = 21–32 }} Other proprietary formats were created by industry either to hold specific metadata or encode signals into proprietary containers.
In 2016 at the annual GNU Radio conference, a workshop focused on how a better open source container for RF signals could be constructed and maintained. In the following year the initial release of SigMF was created to provide a portable & annotated container for radio signals. In June 2021 the SigMF specifications and open source software was moved from GNU Radio's GitHub repository to a new SigMF-specific GitHub organization and repository; the project is no longer an effort specific to GNU Radio.{{Citation needed|date=September 2024}} The SigMF standard has since been incorporated into numerous pieces of software and academic research.{{Cite report |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.21236/ad1194292 |title=Minimal Set of Signal Metadata Format(SigMF) Keys for RF Test Data Sets Using the Advanced Electronic Warfare Laboratory (AEWL) |last1=Necsoiu |first1=Marius |last2=Ranney |first2=Kenneth |date=2023-02-23 |publisher=DEVCOM Army Research Laboratory |location=Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD |last3=Tadas |first3=Dannielle |last4=Magill |first4=Andre |last5=Tesny |first5=Neal |last6=Diehl |first6=William|doi=10.21236/ad1194292 |url-access=subscription }}{{Citation |title=microsoft/gr-azure |date=2024-06-12 |url=https://github.com/microsoft/gr-azure |access-date=2024-06-28 |publisher=Microsoft}}{{Cite book |last1=Badger |first1=R. David |last2=Jung |first2=Kristopher H. |last3=Kim |first3=Minje |date=2021-08-23 |title= 2021 29th European Signal Processing Conference (EUSIPCO)|chapter= An Open-Sourced Time-Frequency Domain RF Classification Framework|chapter-url=http://dx.doi.org/10.23919/eusipco54536.2021.9615929 |pages=1701–1705 |publisher=IEEE |doi=10.23919/eusipco54536.2021.9615929|isbn=978-9-0827-9706-0 }}{{Cite book |last1=Kokalj-Filipovic |first1=Silvija |last2=Miller |first2=Rob |last3=Morman |first3=Joshua |chapter=Targeted Adversarial Examples Against RF Deep Classifiers |date=2019-05-15 |title=Proceedings of the ACM Workshop on Wireless Security and Machine Learning |chapter-url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/3324921.3328792 |pages=6–11 |location=New York, NY, USA |publisher=ACM |doi=10.1145/3324921.3328792|isbn=978-1-4503-6769-1 }}{{Cite web |last=MISP |date=2023-08-23 |title=MISP now supports Signal Metadata Format Specification SigMF |url=https://www.misp-project.org/2023/08/23/MISP_now_supports_Signal_Metadata_Format_Specification_SigMF.html/ |access-date=2024-06-28 |website=MISP Open Source Threat Intelligence Platform & Open Standards For Threat Information Sharing |language=en-us}}
Adoption
References
{{Reflist}}
{{Commons category|GNU Radio}}
{{Portal|Free and open-source software|Radio}}
External links
- {{Official website|https://sigmf.org/}} for the current specification.
- [https://github.com/sigmf/sigmf-python Python SigMF Module] for reading, writing, and editing datasets.
- [https://github.com/sigmf/libsigmf C++ SigMF Library]
- [https://github.com/JuliaIO/SigMF.jl Julia SigMF Library]
Category:Digital container formats
Category:Digital signal processing