File Organization

Hello all, Appreciate your thoughts on this. I received a hard drive with a lot of working tracks from stuff that friends and I had created long ago. Problem is, these working tracks are in various, unorganized folders. As I open a project that I wish to work on (and add tracks), I am forever chasing down the location of the original working tracks, and then confusing matters more with the new tracks that I create. How would you go about organizing all of these working tracks? Or how do you approach track management in general when working in Sonar? Thanks, Chris

Here's what I did to straighten out unorganized projects. It took a while but it's very neat and tidy now. I am an organization freak anyway so I didn't mind the time. I only do this for a hobby so if you do real work, adapt to your workflow and needs.

Here's the main idea of what I did:
After thinking about my workflow (testing, learning, record > mix > master > Make CD's), I sketched out a new file system. Then, I created a new "top" or "main" folder away from everything else. Under that, I created the sub folders of my new file system. Then I called up each project and did a "save as" into the new file system (into my "Recording" folder). This put everything I need in the new system so I could eventually abandon all the old stuff. I deleted the old stuff after all was well in the new file system.


I use "per project audio folders", which keeps the wav files for each project together !!!

My projects start in my "Recording" folder, move (via "save as") to my "Mixing" folder, then move (via "save as") to  my "Collections" folder, which is their final resting place along with the exported final mix, which in my case is what goes to CD.

My file system looks like this: (looks ugly here - try to follow the indents)

   Main Folder (mine is called Sonar 2012 [for now])   
        Recording (New recordings. They get deleted after "save as" to Mixing Folder)
              Project 1 Folder (Folder for a song. Gets created when starting a "New Project")
                 Project 1 .cwp (A song)
                 Audio Folder (wavs for project 1)
              Project 2 Folder  (Folder for a song. Gets created when starting a "New Project")   
              and so on ...
        Mixing  (Projects being mixed. They get deleted after "save as" to Collections Folder)
                Project 1 Folder (Folder for a song. Need to create this during "save as" from Recording folder.)
                   Project 1 .cwp (a "save as" from Recording folder)
                   Audio Folder (wavs for project 1)
                Project 2 Folder  (Folder for a song. Need to create this during "save as" from Recording folder.)  
                and so on ...
        Collections  (Top folder for my "official" albums. In my mind a collection = an album.)
                 Collection1  (My Album number 1. Collection 1 could be replaced with Album name.)
                      Project 1 Folder   (first song on the album. Need to create this during "save as" from Mixing folder)
                          Project 1 .cwp (THE FINAL VERSION TO KEEP FOREVER)
                          Audio  (wavs for Project 1)
                      Project 2  Folder   (first song on the album. Need to create this during "save as" from Mixing folder)                
                          Project 2.cwp  (THE FINAL VERSION TO KEEP FOREVER)
                          Audio (wavs for Project 2)
                      Project 1.wav (exported final mix. This is my Mastered version cuz I'm hobby.)
                      Project 2.wav (exported final mix. This is my Mastered version cuz I'm hobby.)
                 Collection2 (My Album number 2. Collection 2 could be replaced with Album name.)
            
                  and so on ... 

I also included these new folders directly under "Main" for my own way of managing other stuff:

          Incoming           (wavs, projects, and bundles from others)
          Library               (my own wavs and midi files I use to build songs)
          Ideas                 (short recordings to capture some inspired moments)
          Testing              (playground for learning Sonar)


Sam