The more time I spend programming the more I realize how much efficiency can be gained by using the command line for as much as possible.

This holds true for audio conversion. One of my hobbies is making digital recordings of music and mixes from my record collection. I record .wav files but I want to compress them to .mp3 so I can listen on my portable devices. It’s a cinch with LAME, which stands for Lame ain't an MP3 encoder. It comes standard on OSX.

A simple command to make a 192bitrate mp3 file:

lame -b 192 inputFile.wav outputFile.mp3

man lame of course gets you a list of all the available options (and they are many)

It makes quick work of the conversion. I’m sold.