When you're working with MIDI and create an automation track, the default automation type is channel volume. Unfortunately, when you add any automation, the default enables the MIDI channel volume control, sends a control change, and trashes your carefully prepared levels if you're using a soft synth that responds to channel volume (like Kontakt or Sylenth).
The workaround is to mute the MIDI track prior to adding any automation.
 
It would be preferable if Sonar didn't send any MIDI control changes when an automation parameter is added to a track. If I'm automating the mod wheel I really don't want to have to go back and disable the channel level control yet again. It's these kind of fiddly automagic bits that make me swear at my monitor on a regular basis when I'm using Sonar. I really don't want to have to think about if I do X, Y will happen so do Z first. Oh, and why does the mod wheel default to 64 instead of 0?
 

TomHelvey
The workaround is to mute the MIDI track prior to adding any automation.

Or add the automation envelope by choosing the controller from the Edit Filter dropdown instead of opening the automation lane. The edit filter method doesn't immediately add a default volume envelope so it doesn't enable the volume widget.

brundlefly

TomHelvey
The workaround is to mute the MIDI track prior to adding any automation.

Or add the automation envelope by choosing the controller from the Edit Filter dropdown instead of opening the automation lane. The edit filter method doesn't immediately add a default volume envelope so it doesn't enable the volume widget.

That's the entire point, exactly 3 people know that, and it's not in the docs. Not to mention, it's not the first approach anyone would take given the UI.
 

Perhaps the best thing Cakewalk can do for themselves is to understand how people figure out how to use their software. If you don't know how to do something in a DAW, the first thing you do is Google what you're tying to do. For me, 99% of the time, I get a link to the X2 docs, which are usually incorrect. If you're lucky, you'll get a hit on one of Craig's articles (for example: how to set clip gain (it has changed since X2)), the indexed docs are usually wrong.

If you post this in the Feature & Ideas forum, I'll definitely vote for it. The Automation lane button is located right next to the Take lanes button, and I often mistakenly click it and have to remind myself that I need to right-click on the strip's Volume slider and select "Disable Control." 

Every now and then I'll move a volume fader to find it immediately snap back to where it was, and it turns out there is a volume envelope I didn't even know existed. I can only presume that somewhere along the way I've inadvertently opened an automation lane and had it populated with the default volume automation envelope. This has plagued me ever since I joined Sonar in X1 and I always found it baffling that there has to be a default envelope. When I hit the lane button for the first time, I'm saying "show me an automation lane," not "create a volume envelope."

What if you think about creating an automation envelope, open a lane then change your mind? You shouldn't have to delete some dumb default envelope you didn't want. It should be empty until you explicitly select something with the edit filter.

TomHelvey
Perhaps the best thing Cakewalk can do for themselves is to understand how people figure out how to use their software. If you don't know how to do something in a DAW, the first thing you do is Google what you're tying to do. For me, 99% of the time, I get a link to the X2 docs, which are usually incorrect. If you're lucky, you'll get a hit on one of Craig's articles (for example: how to set clip gain (it has changed since X2)), the indexed docs are usually wrong.

Yeah you're liable to get outdated documents when you Google for Sonar instructions. I seem to land on X2 stuff most often. But that's not the worst of it - I frequently get stuck in circular loops of pages which merely mention the subject I'm looking for, link me to some other page, which in turn merely mentions the thing in passing and then links me back to the page I came from. Let's face it, Sonar's documentation is not one of its strong points!