vanblah
 
I can't think of a single time I've ever extended a part of a song that comes before a tempo change where I didn't want the tempo change to move as well.  I could care less about the project itself when it comes to the functions of the song.

I can't think of a time that I've ever extended a part of a song (before the current end point) where I didn't start that process by inserting blank measures. 
 
If you decide that the intro needs to be longer, what you've just decided is that your existing song needs more measures. And Sonar has a function which gives your song more measures and slides everything after the new measures over completely intact and all in one step. 

I can put gas in my car by driving it to the gas station, taking out a 5 gallon gas can, pumping gas into the can 5 gallons at a time and then emptying the gas can into my cars tank. Or I can do it the way the gas station and the car maker designed it to work and just put the gas nozzle right into the gas tank fill tube and pump right into the car's gas tank.
 
Using the 5 gallon can will work. But its not very efficient and adds the potential for bad things to happen (spilling fuel on the ground). Doing it the way the manufacturer designed it to happen works better. 

I can use slide to try to move everything over so I can reuse the measures that are already there. But its not exactly efficient and adds the potential for bad things to happen (not everything slides correctly). Doing it the way the manufacturer designed it to happen (inserting new blank measures) works better.

To be fair, though...DAWs are sufficiently complex that, to use your analogy, people might not even know you can put the gas pump's nozzle directly into the car.
 
The only way I can scale a learning curve is whenever I want to do something and it seems arduous, I read the documentation. Actually one of the best things that's happened to my learning SONAR is trying to help people here on the forums. I'll go to the documentation so I can refer to a particular solution, and in the process, I find out about all kinds of other things I didn't know about.
 
Any DAW requires study. If someone spends just five minutes a day looking at the documentation to research a specific function, their rewards will be manifold. As the old joke goes...Q: What's a power user?  A: Someone who reads the manual.

A fair and valid point. I guess my comments were more directed at those who, when instructed on how to do what they're trying to do the right way, simply say well I don't want the program to work the way it was designed to work, I want it work MY way.

JohanSebatianGremlin
A fair and valid point. I guess my comments were more directed at those who, when instructed on how to do what they're trying to do the right way, simply say well I don't want the program to work the way it was designed to work, I want it work MY way.

Anderton
 
Any DAW requires study. If someone spends just five minutes a day looking at the documentation to research a specific function, their rewards will be manifold. As the old joke goes...Q: What's a power user?  A: Someone who reads the manual.

These right here are the issues! Often it seems that people believe software must be designed to work exactly how they personally want it too rather than by the programmers design. Every minute spent reading the user guide of any complex software will be returned a  hundredfold.
 
'Sonar just isn't smart enough'? Perhaps the problem is that some Sonar users are just not smart enough to read the manual(I  jest - no offence intended silverbluemedallion! )

"Sonar Just Isn't Smart Enough "

 
 
........What ....says' who ? .........
 
IQ test results

             SONAR

 
Someone who takes the time to read the Manual

 
Someone who doesn't take the time to read the Manual 

 
Kenny
 
PS , if your gonna spell SONAR in a thread title it is spelled SONAR not Sonar

JohanSebatianGremlin
A fair and valid point. I guess my comments were more directed at those who, when instructed on how to do what they're trying to do the right way, simply say well I don't want the program to work the way it was designed to work, I want it work MY way.

Yes, that's quite different from the point I was making and I agree you've identified a major source of frustration for many people. One of the aspects that fascinates me about software, whether you're talking SONAR, Microsoft Word, or Windows 10 is how different people use the same software in entirely different ways. Even something as simple as moving files in Windows is done differently by different people.
 
However there are limits, because every piece of software does have a design ethos and a personality. For example when Ableton Live first appeared, it was all about drag and drop. At the time that was not a common practice in DAWs, so people who came to it with preconceptions based on the DAW world thought it was the worst, most complicated software on the planet because nothing worked they way they expected. OTOH those for whom Live was their first computer-based software (I still don't think of it as a "DAW" in the conventional sense) just accepted at face value that it was based on drag and drop, and didn't question that design decision.
 
The beauty of SONAR for me is its versatility, but part of that is due to allowing multiple ways to do tasks that, at least superficially, seem the same. For example, it seems entirely logical that if you're going to slide a bunch of tracks over, that sliding should do what inserting measures does. But it doesn't, because sliding is oriented toward moving data within a track, while inserting is oriented toward changing the actual structure of a project. It's a fine point, and it's not really explained specifically anywhere (although the functions are located under different menu items, which is clue).
 
Unfortunately there are no shortcuts to being a "Jedi Master" for any DAW. Like anything in life you want to master, it requires discipline and study. Now, that isn't always necessary; I like to drive a car, but I'm never going to become a race car driver. With SONAR, you don't need to learn everything to get a lot out of it. But if you want to exploit it to its full potential, there's no substitute for spending time studying it and learning its nuances.

Oh, and one last comment before I run off to post the tip of the week: If people DO want to make SONAR smarter, enable analytics. 

Maybe we just edit too much. It seems the more editing capabilities there is the more problems there are. Maybe the old way was better. Don't rely on editing so much.

Anderton
.........b) making SONAR more accessible to new users

 
This is the most salient point for me. We DO need to keep attracting new users and cross-graders. And I would fully support the CW programmers if they chose to make this more of a priority!