Again, thanks to everyone who contributed. I pursued this because I was convinced there had to be an easier answer than select to time.

Sure enough, I finally learned to simply click the Select tool from the control bar, and then click the clip. It highlights and auto-determines the length of that clip only.

I'm guessing the last time I used the select tool, I somehow set the max clip length. After that, even though I clicked the track number I didn't actually "select" the clip, so the length remained unchanged.

Just a guess, but it did teach me two things:

1. Use the select tool more often (its easy!)

2. Read the reference manual more often.

I also like the idea of dragging along the time line. Thanks scook.

This might save other novices time lost like what happened to me.

Maybe by Sonar x"47e" I might actually understand how things work!!!!!

Thanks for this thread. It solves a long standing issue for me as I was exporting multiple tracks then loading the single new track into new project and editing the exported track. Phew! Time line much easier :-)

My method is to place two markers labeled "Start" and "End" at the points on the timeline where I want the export to begin and end. These can be adjusted later if necessary if I hear reverb tails getting chopped off, or there is excessive silence at either end, or a count-in remnant is still audible.
 
When I export, I first press CTL-A to select all tracks, then jump to the Start marker, make that the beginning of the selection, and then jump to the End marker and make that the end of the selection. I do all this with a sequence of keystrokes that have become second-nature after many thousands of repetitions. With a programmable keyboard you could do it all with a single keystroke.
 
(I don't like making timeline selections by dragging because it's imprecise - unless grid snap is turned on, but I don't use grid snap.)
 
This method guarantees that every export will be exactly the same length, will never need to be re-verified before the next step, and that any subsequent MP3 will always be the same size, too.

By the way I should have mentioned that when you drag a clip to the desktop, if it's a Groove Clip it retains its grooviness.

bitflipper

All else is in doubt, so this is the truth I cling to. 

What's this?  
I see Sin X over X!  What however is the message? Am I the only one who "Don't Get It no gud"?
 

I set the start and end times as described above and that works fine.  I will note, however, that sometimes Sonar thinks the end of the song is farther out than it is.  Even when I see no audio or MIDI data beyond a certain point, Sonar still thinks the clips extend farther.  I'm not sure what causes this.
 
Sometimes I can fixing by using the scissors to cut off the blank end of one or more clips, but sometimes that doesn't work because Sonar thinks the clips are empty.
 
Example: Last data is at 3:40.  Shading appears to show a clip going on until 4:00, even though there is no data.  Sonar will not let me split the clip at 3:40 because there is no data past 3:40.
 
Although I can select the region to export, this is annoying because Sonar wants to keep playing past the end.

cpkoch

bitflipper

All else is in doubt, so this is the truth I cling to. 

What's this?  
I see Sin X over X!  What however is the message? Am I the only one who "Don't Get It no gud"?
 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyquist%E2%80%93Shannon_sampling_theorem
 
I adopted the sig during a contentious online discussion in which a couple posters claimed the Nyquist theorem was wrong. Almost every other aspect of audio is open to debate and subject to opinion. But not this one.

I'm not sure if you've discovered the answer yet but I had the same problem.  The trick is to go to the [Edit] menu [Select] and then [None].  It seems counter-intuitive but now that you have nothing selected and you export audio [Tracks] you'll find each track is exported to its correct length.  Especially useful for batch processing recordings to the bit depth and the sampling frequency you desire.

Unless my computer clock is playing tricks, its been 4 years since the OP asked this question.  I assume he either found the answer or quit recording audio.