tenfoot
It's a bit like saying this car is rubbish because it sank when I tried to drive it across the lake.

 
I respectfully disagree. If recording to more than several lanes is NOT an "intended" use of the feature, then SONAR should limit the number of lanes each track can create. For those who don't understand what I mean, please record to 30-40 lanes in the track, comp the takes, and try to adjust the split points (inconvenience explained in this thread), or create clip automation envelopes in each lane and then click the expand/collapse Take lanes button (it will take several seconds to just expand/close them).
 
Also, the fifth issue in this thread is an officially confirmed bug. And that's what the OP is talking about.

Thanks for all the feedback! I really do appreciate it. Here's my use case:
 
1. Why a separate file: My main project has several dozen tracks, effects, markers and tempo changes and stuff like that. My vocals will be a group of 4-5 women and another group of 4-5 men. They will all actually be me and my wife, recording clones of ourselves with multiple takes. Also, my wife has a really great voice but is totally untrained, so I took her part and broke it up into short, singable snippets that she can securely handle, then I will splice them together to make the real part. 4-5 times, to make the group of women. Also, to add both a layer of crispness and a layer of strangeness, I record at half tempo, then use the length tool to shorten them. Lastly, because this song takes place on an alien planet, I am having her sing a 2nd or 3rd up, then transpose her down to get a sort of alien effect. So, combining the splicing of clips, the multiple takes, the length tool, the transpose tool, a little Melodyne, and doing it all 4-5 times, it's way easier to have a "sketchpad" that isn't cluttered with everything else in the project. I could add tracks at the bottom and go way out past the end of the piece to keep it all separate, but this seemed a saner choice.
 
2. How I use take lanes: I think Take Lanes were designed for people doing a bunch of takes of a part, then saving one and moving on. Problem is I am actually saving more than one of the takes, as I am recording clones of myself, either in unison or harmony. Sometimes this is simple double-tracking, but just as often I'm recording a group of 4-6 voices in unison. My preferred recording method is to do takes of small phrases and then splice them together, rather than sing a whole song in one take. A single verse might be split into as many as 4-6 separate phrases, each one recorded separately. I find that by singing the same phrase over and over I learn quickly what vocal inflections I like or don't, what notes I'm having trouble hitting, etc. 
 
Also, due to limited quiet time in the house, I have to record all my phrases in one session, so I'll end up with a track of dozens of phrases, and maybe a dozen takes of each phrase. My vocal recording tracks get enormous, with a lot of vertical scrolling involved.
 
So, imagine this track with dozens of small clips, and now I have to shorten the length, transpose them, pitch-correct them, and finally copy them to the real project. 
 
Ideas welcome!

icontakt

tenfoot
It's a bit like saying this car is rubbish because it sank when I tried to drive it across the lake.

 
I respectfully disagree. If recording to more than several lanes is NOT an "intended" use of the feature, then SONAR should limit the number of lanes each track can create. For those who don't understand what I mean, please record to 30-40 lanes in the track, comp the takes, and try to adjust the split points (inconvenience explained in this thread), or create clip automation envelopes in each lane and then click the expand/collapse Take lanes button (it will take several seconds to just expand/close them).
 
Also, the fifth issue in this thread is an officially confirmed bug. And that's what the OP is talking about.

I respectfully agree with your respectful disagreement. If we're not supposed to do something, the software shouldn't let us do it. "You should just know" is not a software design philosophy.
 
Thanks for linking to the other threads. That list of bugs contains either things that constantly bother me, or things I didn't know I could do, and then watching you do them, know now I'm glad I never tried to do them.
 
I'm continually dismayed when new versions are released, and at the top of them is "Look at all these new bells and whistles", and you scroll wayyyyy down to the lesser improvements, and they say something like "Various bug fixes". It should be the other way around. Or better yet. Release a version where they say "Introducing Sonar Titanium! With NO new features at all, but 1,218 bugs fixed!"
 
THAT I would buy. It's not laziness or lack of money that I'm still on X3.

My comments were offered in the spirit of helping the OP get done what he's trying to get done, not to defend the current implementation. It's possible that minor modifications to his workflow will allow the current take lane implementation to do the job for him.
 
That said, a quick scan of the help docs shows that Cakewalk fully intended for the user to be able to crop and size individual clips within take lanes and provided special smart tool behavior as well as a dedicated comping tool for that purpose. They also intend for clips to be bounced within the take lane, judging by bug fix reports of bouncing issues in take lanes. I don't see anything in the docs warning that any kind of processing of take lanes results in a flattening operation, though it is possible that it's there and I simply couldn't find the reference. 
 
So I understand and sympathize with the OP's frustration. Most of what he's trying to do should work. I do have a question though. When you say "processing", what kinds of operations are you referring to? It may be that specific kinds of processing will result in flattening, but it's hard to say what they are without knowing the specifics.
 
 

jkoseattle
 
I'm continually dismayed when new versions are released, and at the top of them is "Look at all these new bells and whistles", and you scroll wayyyyy down to the lesser improvements, and they say something like "Various bug fixes". It should be the other way around. Or better yet. Release a version where they say "Introducing Sonar Titanium! With NO new features at all, but 1,218 bugs fixed!"
 
THAT I would buy. It's not laziness or lack of money that I'm still on X3.

 
I get your frustration, but there have been quite a few fixes in Sonar to take lanes this last year over several of the monthly updates. You can find them by searching the Sonar knowledge base with "sonar 2015 update fixes take lane". The ones you want fixed may not be there, but they are fixing the issues and they are documenting them in the knowledge base (along with all the other fixes) when they do.
 
 

kevinwal 
I get your frustration, but there have been quite a few fixes in Sonar to take lanes this last year over several of the monthly updates. You can find them by searching the Sonar knowledge base with ...
 

 
I've just checked and below are Take lane issues fixed after X3e:
 
1. Crashes could occur when recording multiple MIDI takes on take lanes (CWBRN-43247)
2. Undoing “Delete Lane” no longer reorders lanes
3. Resolved Zoom Tool issues with collapsed lanes/folders
4. Fixed issue where edge editing clips in take lanes could cause drawing issues and a crash
5. Last take lane now persists in mute state
6. Zooming on take lanes would zoom to parent track
7. Fixed an issue where adding fades could cause waveforms not to draw correctly on Groove clips
8. Resolved a case where dragging audio clips from the Browser could create an additional Take Lane (CWBRN-24452)
9. Fixed an issue where adjacent punch recording could unexpectedly create a new lane (CWBRN-23909)
10. Fixed an issue where undoing overlapping clips could leave empty lanes (CWBRN-23897)
11. Resolved a case where pasting a composite clip to a new track could cause a hang
12. Resolved an issue where un-archiving a track caused lanes to appear inverted
 
 
One (and possibly a few more?) of these issues was a new issue introduced last year (#5).
I highly appreciated they fixed #3, 9 and 10.

Just chiming in here, I actually constantly edit clips in take lanes. Melodyne and clip gain automation mostly. I haven't really had any issues with it. I tend to just forget to flatten the comp as most of the time, it's an unnecessary step for my workflow.

For me...
 
Used as intended Take Lanes are a beautiful thing. One of the best things about them is that you are not forced to use them as intended. The have no seat belts or crash bags and few restraints. For me it makes them fun and tricky.
 
Don't stop me from doing crazy stuff by keeping me from doing it. The Sonar environment lets you push things beyond what some may say is reasonable. That is a nice to have in my book.
 
Take Lanes beyond the use described in the docs are at your own risk as far as I go. For instance I don't remember if the docs mention applying clip automation to clips in a take lane, but you can (I guess), so be as safe as you need.

icontakt
Those who are happy with Take lanes don't do these:
 
- record to more than several lanes per track,
- record more than several clips per lane,
- use clip automation,
- adjust split points, and
- copy/cut and past clips across lanes.
 
And I've been very unhappy with the feature (I submitted a couple of FRs but they've been unimplemented...)

I do all of those things and they work fine. Well I think I do because I don't know what you mean by "record to more than several lanes per track". Do you mean recording into multiple lanes on the same track at once or do you mean recording a buttload of takes into the same track?
 
If you mean the former then... I don't thing you're supposed to do that, I've never tried it and I'm not sure what purpose that would serve. If you mean the latter I consistently record dozens of takes (takes while I'm writing a part, takes while I'm tweaking a part, takes while I'm practicing a part and then a bunch of finals to comp together into a super take).
 
I also VERY often record different sections into the same track thus creating groups of lanes for each section at different spots on the timeline. The only annoyance there is after I'm done I have to create ONE empty lane and move ONE clip because the first take in a new section populates the last take of the previous section. Not a big deal but I prefer each pass have it's own lane in all instances.
 
@jko...
 
Are you copying each little clip or do you flatten them in the Vocal project so you end up with one long take for each part after all your futzing about? If you are not flattening then totally do that to make copying easier.
 
You can make MULTIPLE Comps in the same track. You just have to unsolo each Flattened comp to unmute the other lanes again. I do this often and create alternate versions/doubles of parts this way.
 
Also I think I'd probably use the Browser for this instead of copying back and forth between projects. So once you get your comps together export them to a special and easy to access folder (do the exports from the start of the project so they line up properly in the target project). Then in the target project use the Browser to navigate to that folder, Select the target track, set your Now Time to the start of the project, right click on the files and select "Insert at Now Time". The clips will be inserted in a new Take Lane in the track each time.
 
When using the Browser you can of course just use Drag and Drop both for Exporting and Importing the clips (dragging to the Browser will export to whatever folder you drag it to). In that case you just gotta make sure your clips are trimmed to an exact reference point on the timeline so you can line them up in the target project (so trim the clips or if you want them to start at 00:00:00 drag the start of the clips to the start of the project before Drag/Drop exporting if need be).
 
This may sound like a lot of futzery but once you get into the swing of it it's pretty quick and is much more precise.
 
I've always found traditional Cut/Copy/Paste in Sonar to be unreliable and weird as heck.
 
Cheers.

I might be completely missing the point of what you are trying to achieve, so forgive me if I'm wrong.  I too have many problems with take lanes. Unexpected things happen all the time to me, and I never seem to get on top of it. I certainly don't go to the lengths you do, but I do create new projects for vocals to a backing track, just to keep things filed in a way that leaves me feeling more protected than anything else. Then, when all vocals are done, I bring them back to the main project.
 
But there is one thing I do that I don't see mentioned here. After I have comp'd up my takes to what I want for the first pass, I will flatten the comp, copy to a new track, unlock, and bounce to clip. It seems to be the only way I can find that completely disassociates the clip from the original take lanes. Then, I will go back to the take lanes to comp up version two, which sometimes might be a vocal double, or octave of it, or morphed into an alien I guess in your case, and do the same. Flatten, copy to new track, unlock and bounce. If I have three vocal takes in mind from the same take lanes, then I will have 3 separate tracks. I do the same for all vocals including backing vocals. So possibly 6 or 7 tracks to export into the main project. But I will usually do any basic pitch correction, stretching, basic eq etc to these new tracks before exporting. Not too much, because I like to get this right within the main mix.
 
I have never found a way for the comping, flattening etc, that doesn't cause issues when trying to work on those tracks, without it somehow affecting the take lanes. It ALWAYS goes wrong for me. The above process works for me. Probably a better way, but I'm not changing anything until I finish my current work. Good luck with it. Just have to find a way that works for you.