This toolkit deals with the way we can store, and play sounds.
The most famous one is to record or create the sounds waves. It’s the way you take when you use a digital recorder like a smartphone. If you record your voice with that kind of tools, you can listen back something very close to your voice. The quality depends on microphones, sound-cards and speakers used, but the concept is to store and reproduce exactly the sounds waves. If it is now possible for us to do that because of our technologies, it was not the case in the past. And if you wanted to listen to some Mozart compositions you had to find someone who can read sheet and play it on a piano.

more on the wiki…