There is a FR or three that would be worth finding and voting on if you hate it as much as some of the rest of us do. 

I've also experienced the same inconsistencies with ACT on my APro.  I'd feel a bit better if I could predict what was going to work and what wasn't but I can't.  I'm with you Sharke!

I feel for you. I get frustrated a LOT, by a lot of things that either don't work right or I don't understand how to work them. I used to get so frustrated with one thing and then another when trying to learn to use a DAW,... I would work for hours, get nothing done, finally just quit before I resorted to using an hammer on the computer. Then I would be bust doing other things and try again in a month or so and by this time I'd forgotten anything I might have learned the last time. Thankfully it has gotten easier I no longer have to use a Midiman Mixim 10 or a JL Cooper MIDI Sync or other things like that.
 
Really, I am sorry to read this. I figured that a Roland keyboard made to use with Sonar would work flawlessly with ACT. You'd think it should be as easy as plug in and click a button or several but it should be easy and it should work.
I hope you get it working. Frustration is very frustrating.  
Schwartzhog seems to help sometimes, at least for me!
 
Julien

sharke
I will take a look at azslow3's plugin.
...
Oftentimes you just want to perform a couple of controls on the synth, for instance cutoff and decay, and capture that performance in automation lanes. There is no way that should be as convoluted as it is. A quick MIDI learn on the envelope and we're off.

That is exactly what "ACT Speed Dial"+Save/Recall does. I will prepare example preset soon.
Exact sequence of operations (once you configured things correctly, but that is one time operation): move "cutoff" press "Assign to R1" button, move "decay" press "Assign to R2" button. Done, R1 control "cutoff", R2 control "decay". ACT configuration does not change, no dialogs, no menu selections, no MIDI assignments in sonar (which sometime tricky to manage).
 

icontakt
I just did a quick test (including restarting Sonar) with SI-Strings, and it's working as expected (meaning the order is still correct after restarting Sonar).

Thanks! There is some hope I can find why it does not work for me.

azslow3

sharke
I will take a look at azslow3's plugin.
...
Oftentimes you just want to perform a couple of controls on the synth, for instance cutoff and decay, and capture that performance in automation lanes. There is no way that should be as convoluted as it is. A quick MIDI learn on the envelope and we're off.

That is exactly what "ACT Speed Dial"+Save/Recall does. I will prepare example preset soon.
Exact sequence of operations (once you configured things correctly, but that is one time operation): move "cutoff" press "Assign to R1" button, move "decay" press "Assign to R2" button. Done, R1 control "cutoff", R2 control "decay". ACT configuration does not change, no dialogs, no menu selections, no MIDI assignments in sonar (which sometime tricky to manage).
 

icontakt
I just did a quick test (including restarting Sonar) with SI-Strings, and it's working as expected (meaning the order is still correct after restarting Sonar).

Thanks! There is some hope I can find why it does not work for me.

What?, Where?, How?
 
This sounds like a silver bullet for my A PRO woes as others have described. Where does one find this program? I need it.

Act has always been a major disappointment for me . about now we should have some give us a link to a whole process on how to use Act , and make us feel like theres nothing wrong .
Sharke said it correct , the new kids on the block aren't going to Go thru pages of setup when other daws really have 2 clicks .
Personally I use native map on my Komplete controller with the new update imo is insane , and if it's not a pluging with ultimate 10 or a midi learn right click , no controller gets used for mapping , I'll use the mouse , I don't feel like setting up act to have it fail on next reboot . Or not work at all and get frustrated n quit working on music , and that scenario has happened 100's of times . Thanks ACT. But we're. All wrong it works flawless right ?

ampfixer
What?, Where?, How?

In one hour or so, here. The preset is already created, but I have to write the answer on "How?"
 
Please do not expect it is A-Pro full feature preset PLUS described functionality. It is ONLY described functionality.
 
I do not have APRO, but in case there is an interest I can create full scale preset for it. For "What?" you can visit my site (see the signature) and read about/manual/tutorials. Everything you can find there can be applied to APro or any other surface.

Thanks, I'll have a look!

djjhart@aol.com
Sharke said it correct , the new kids on the block aren't going to Go thru pages of setup when other daws really have 2 clicks .

Not DAWs, keyboard producers are more interested to be compatible with these DAWs.

Personally I use native map on my Komplete controller

And you have paid at most $250 for the device and the rest (you know how much) so it works in "2 clicks". Have you spend such money for Sonar? Are you ready to pay $500 so Sonar works with your Komplete in 2 clicks?

What makes the horror of ACT even worse is that the documentation is terrible. Searching for anything in the online help is frustrating because often you get stuck in endless circles of following links which just mention the subject in passing and then link you to another page which once again mentions it in passing and directs you to another page...often the one you started from. I've never been a fan of Cakewalk's online help, and Googling for stuff more often than not gives you links to help documents for older versions of Sonar. 
 
But even the manual PDF is frustrating, once you've actually managed to find the relevant chapter. For instance in setting up ACT for the A-PRO controllers, it says to make sure that A-PRO 2 is selected in the MIDI output dropdown. So I look and of course there IS no A-PRO 2 listed as a MIDI output, it's just a MIDI input. I actually had to read various Cakewalk users's guides to setting up ACT on the forum to find out that it's OK to select plain A PRO for the MIDI output.