Audio Units are plug-ins for Apple's CoreAudio framework which generate or process audio streams.
Audio Units (commonly referred to as simply "AU") are plug-ins for Apple's CoreAudio system which are capable of generating or processing audio streams. Although Audio Units were originally created to compete with Steinberg's VST SDK, they have evolved in quite different directions.
Currently Mac OSX and iOS are the only platforms which support the Audio Unit SDK. Both OSX and iOS ship with a number of default Audio Units for basic audio stream operations, though it is possible to write custom Audio Units on both platforms.
Resources:
- Audio Unit development fundamentals for Mac OS X
- Audio Unit Framework Reference
- Apple's Audio Unit hosting documentation for iOS
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