After X3d: saving a project as a MIDI file type 1 ignores muted tracks

Please can you give us clear steps sequential steps to repro right from the beginning like a shopping list.
Please see if you can reproduce this with a NEW project rather than an old one.
e.g.
STEPS TO REPRODUCE
 
1) Create new project.
2)) Insert MIDI track.
 
Over to you... :)
 
Thanks...

John
 
I can reproduce however I'm not sure if MIDI type 1 supports Mute?
I looked on the internet and couldn't see anything to confirm this.
RIFF MIDI format works the way you want it.

Would you mind posting your CWBRN here?

Can anybody else in these forums definitively say that MIDI type 1 supports mutes?
 
Thanks

Thanks in my unofficial bug list. Keep us updated.

In reference to MIDI export won't save mutes - well, err "MUTE"  is NOT part of the midi spec - in which case it is not a fault....if one wants a "muted" midi track, then the only two options are to set the volume to 0 , or insert a CC 11 (expression) with a value of 0. THe "mute" as per the track button in Sonar quite correctly does not get saved to a midi file.
 
Now unless I have misunderstood the bug, then it should not be listed as such. No offence meant at all, truly.

Yes,  they (muted midi tracks) still get saved because a midi file has NO idea what a muted track actually is. All it sees is a track with midi data. The Sonar track controls (apart from Volume, Pan, Rev, Chorus, Velocity) are not part of the midi spec and as such have no effect on what does or does not get saved to the midi file.
 
As I wrote the only ways to NOT have them not audible/saved is to have a 0 volume, a CC 11 value of 0, or to delete the track. Oh one could also set the velocity to -127 - bit extreme but it would at least retain the actual notes/controller data in the track.
 
But by far the simplest way is to set the track volume to 0, so that the resulting midi file will still have the midi data, but will not be heard. But again it is NOT a bug, it is a part of the midi spec and Sonar follows this to the letter, both GM1 and GM2

No, sorry you are not getting it, no offence oh and by the way there is NO difference in format 0 and format 1 apart from format 1 puts all channels and parts onto separate "tracks" in the file. Format 0 puts it all into on single track. So for the purpose of this argument, 0/1 are essentially the same. 
 
The MUTE button on the Sonar track view is an internal Sonar control ONLY! It CAN be saved with a CWP as it is a Sonar based control. The mute status can not be saved as part of a standard midi file, period! Even moving selected tracks to a Folder, does not prevent the data being saved in the SMF
 
Cakewalk COULD introduce a midi saving option to exclude muted tracks from the save process, however this is a feature request NOT a bug, as Sonar saves midi files exactly as they should be! 
 
All I am saying is this is not a bug, but a normal part of MIDI. If the OP wants the option to exclude muted tracks from saving (and I DO think it is a good idea btw) then it is a feature request only imo. 
 
 
 

Yes I understood you agreed with that  but there has been no change in behaviour  as claimed by the OP.  AFAIK, and IIRC Cakewalk/Sonar has NEVER given the option to selectively save midi tracks. IE, there was never an option to select ONLY "live tracks" and exclude mute tracks for the saved SMF. It has only ever saved whatever MIDI tracks are in the project. Processing has nothing to do with it - I would suggest the OP is recalling an option that was never there. It did not even do it automatically (only save non-muted tracks)...perhaps the OP had, co-incidentally, tracks that were 0 volume AND muted and ergo he thinks the muted track was not saved???
 
Now on the other hand Sonar has (and always has) saved the mute status in a CWP file...
 
Sonar does not process anything before it saves a midi file, so how the OP can say it somehow has stopped doing something it has never done is beyond me! Oh there are a couple of things it will "process" when saving, and these are the transpose value and velocity values set using the track controls and not manually applied to a track by the user via the Process Menu).
 
edited to remove two stray words at the end

Look, Alex, I do not think the OP is giving the full story here. And I have been using MIDI for decades, and writing and editing midi files for Roland, Korg Yamaha et al...Any file I created and saved where I forgot to zero the volume of a part (even if muted in the CWP) always played on my Roland keyboards (including a Fantom!) 
 
I have a feeling "in my water" that something the OP did with these files "years ago" he is not saying or is not remembering. And I looked at the bug report file he submitted...the behaviour of Sonar is as expected not what the OP expects...
 
And where is the Cakewalk "reproduced" data? I would like to see the Cakewalk response to his "bug" report pasted above? It says "reproducible" at the bottom as that is HIS view...And of course it is reproducible because Sonar is doing what it should be doing - normal behaviour.
 
D

So this filtering out of muted MIDI when doing the save is being presented as a "feature" that existed in previous versions but was lost in the version update? I find nothing in the documentation that would specifically lead one to believe that muted MIDI clips would NOT be saved. The semantics of whether this is a bug or not are probably not too important.
 
The option to not export muted data is clearly the intended behavior when exporting audio:
" Alternatively, you can mute tracks or buses you don’t want to include in the mixdown, and then check Track Mute/Solo or Bus Mute/Solo in the Mix Enables field so that SONAR uses that information as a guide when picking what data to include in the exported file."
http://www.cakewalk.com/Documentation/default.aspx?Doc=SONAR%20X3&Lang=EN&Req=Dialogs1.45.html
 
I would think the workaround would be to save the current project under another name, delete the offending muted MIDI clips/tracks in the "new" project, then do the Save AS> MIDI from the project. So long as you know this is going to happen it should not be a major problem. A bit more work no doubt.

To clarify. There is a change in behaviour. 
I have an older version of Sonar on another PC and fired it up to confirm the issue before filing the CWBRN. And no, I don't want to keep digging it out, swapping my screen, keyboard and mouse to do this routine editing and saving - why should I when CW introduced the issue in X3d?
 
Also, over the last six years I have edited and prepared hundreds of  MIDI files using this facility of muting tracks before saving as a .MID to use on my Fantom X6 (mostly guitar tracks because I play the guitar parts live but it's handy to keep the tracks in case I want to check a riff or something at a future date). So, I'm not hallucinating. I haven't changed something else in my setup and inadvertently introduced the issue.  The  CWBRN moved a few weeks ago to 'Under investigation' so I'm still waiting for at least an update of that status from Cakewalk. I'll repost if and when I see an update.
 
As for MIDI standards compliance, a muted status on a track may well not exist, but I assume the original (laudable) intention of CW was to allow you to simply not save the track by muting it. Perhaps a programmer thought that wasn't 100% MIDI compliant so 'corrected' it.

Well do let us know when and IF Cakewalk get back to you on this...as far as I can see there has been no response at all from them to the OP (well none he has shared) , and clearly no comment on this thread.
 
As I said, I have prepared many hundreds of SMF files, format 0 and format 1, going all the way back to Cakewalk 4 (pre audio days) and never has it saved a SMF ignoring muted tracks in the save process.  Maybe it was an option I missed all those years as I simply assumed it ran according to the MMA specs??
 
So it would be very interesting to get a Cakewalk response to this...

For example, I found this from a search and the page relates to X2 - I will continue to try and find more references ...although even searches through old forums posts indicate saving the status of a muted track was never possible..
 
The quote:
While playback is in progress, you can mute and unmute tracks in any combination, which means you can hear only the tracks that you want. You can change the status of a track in the Track view, the Console view, the Track Inspector, or the Mix module in the Control Bar. If a track is both muted and soloed, it does not play. Mute has precedence.
The track status is saved with the SONAR project file. If you save a SONAR project as a standard MIDI File, however, all tracks are saved without mute, solo, or archive indicators.
 
Link is http://www.cakewalk.com/D...p;Req=Playback.11.html

Thanks Scook

John, sorry m8, but you really need to read the thread - it is about the mute status of a track in regard to saving as a standard midi file, NOT a project file (or CWP)