I would like to see a MIDI track-to-track equalizer function. This functions would balance track input levels across multiple H/W and S/W synths.

Exactly how can you change the H/W synths EQ when the Sound Engine is External in the Module or Keyboard??. Sonar can't be expected to know every module and synth on the Markets NRPN / RPN / Controller assignments ??

ORIGINAL: cGar

Great Ideas so far:

I'd just like to bump
1.) Instrument tracks - projects that are all MIDI become increasingly unmanageable as project complexity grows
* Currently I cannot group audio and midi track together because the midi tracks show up on my MCU+XT and that is a waste of a faders
2.) simpler GUI. Less tracks / panes/ windows makes work flow easier and allow for more creativity

I'd also like:
- Built-in P5 arpeggiator

- wet/dry mix parameter for sonitus compressor - give ability to do parallel compression all in the same buss/track. again less tracks/buses is always better!

+1 for instrument tracks. mute/solo and export are additional pain along w/ track clutter in the current scheme

and a BIG +1 for rollling P5 features into Sonar. isn't it about time?

Computer keyboard shortcuts for inserting and change notes in Score view.
A new tool for the Score view similar to keyboard note entry in Finale, Sibelius and NoteWorthy where you can use up and down key to change the pitch of a note. The left and right key to move the selection between notes. Enter key to add a new note and tab to add a rest.


Enhancement in midi step recording
Today you select a fixed duration for step entry f.x 1/8. It would be nice if this value could be depended on how long you hold down the midi keys. That is this value is the minimum value if you play short note. If you hold the note a little longer it would be added as 1/4 note, some longer as half note and if you hold the key down a long time it would be added as a whole note.

Play Order or option to import pointers to other projects
Something to arrange the structure of large works.

Best regards
EyjolfurG

1. No option to pick-up/chase held midi notes. This is mandatory. Don't know why it's not an option.

2. No time-slider in Import>Audio or Rip CD dialog?! What?!?! What if I want to hear the last 12 seconds of a 5 minute file?

3. Plugin delay compensation bypass. ie: I'm at 99% of my finished mixdown (with plugins and UAD plugs etc), but got inspired to add one more piano MIDI track. I will get 100ms of latency with all the plugins, so I have to bypass every single effect bin in every track and group...blah... One button would solve this.

4. OGG File compatibility. Please...can we have the ability to import OGG files without crashes? Thanks.

5. Record in Play..."capture up to 10 minutes of any incoming audio you play in Stop mode or during playback, “after the fact”. This is possible because C****e can capture audio input in buffer memory, even when not recording." Very life-saving if you've needed it!

6. Console/Track highlighting. Another feature I thought would be obvious. Select a track in the track view, the same channel highlights in the console. Simple. Smart.

7. Tape-Machine Style monitoring. (http://forum.cakewalk.com/tm.asp?m=1215835&mpage=1&key=??) - Implemented in 7.0.2!!!

8. "Select All Following" - hit a key command, and all the clips FOLLOWING the NOW TIME get highlighted. SUPER important when editing for film, dialog etc.

9. "Move to Now" - select a clip, hit a key command and the clip snaps to the current NOW TIME position. VITAL when syncing effects etc for film etc...

10. Macro Recorder. For the ability to chain several Sonar commands in a row and trigger it by a single key command.

11. Much more flexible track/channel preset handling. (ie: Saving and loading track presets (with sends, FX bin setting etc) OVERTOP of a current track, without adding a new track and having to drag and drop audio clips from old track to new etc..

12. The ability to scrub clips WITHOUT having to turn off a mute button or putting the channel fader up. Handy if you are importing someone else's OMF and need to hear what a specific clip is without going through more steps/mouse clicks.

13. Perhaps simmer down on the vertical scroll? ie: I'm zoomed in to see two audio tracks at a time, and I want to ALT-SELECT a region across several tracks to remove silence..when I bring the mouse cursor down to the bottom of the track view...the page just TAKES OFF and I'm suddenly looking at my last track (and have WAY more tracks selected than I wanted). Can we SMOOTH the vertical scroll a little more (instead of JUMPING track by track?)

14. Fix the V-Station Powercore Bug

15. When adjusting the pan control in the console with a WHEEL-MOUSE wheel, at a certain point when moving the wheel, the whole console suddenly starts scrolling.

16. I have a 64 track song, and I'd like to organize the mixer so I can select which tracks to show at one time. IE: is there a way I can 'group' all my drum tracks and then assign that to a key command to show only those tracks? And also do this with all BG Vox, etc...? That way I can flip between the track views as I need... instead of scrolling for 64 channels in the console (since SONAR refused to do auto-scroll when selecting a track in the track view)...similar to the current "Track Manager" but able to save view presets etc...instead of simple check on/off.

17. Update the 'remove silence' function to 2007 (ie: a little graphics with the waveform might be nice).

18. Ability to automate mute & solo buttons on busses/groups!?!?!?! How can you miss this one?!?!

19. Make the KEY BINDINGS window searchable? Instead of forcing the user to spend two hours looking for one command.

20. Is there a way we can dbl-click the track/channel FX bin and get a BIG window that shows all the plugs at once? (instead of scrolling up and down each bin)?

21. Make a more obvious indicator in the FX bin when editing a plug. So I double-click a compressor plugin, perhaps highlight/circle the compressor name in the FX bin with a bright red or light blue color so I know which plug on which track I'm working with? especially helpful when having 4 plugins open at once.

22. Where the heck are the simple RW/FF controls? Yes, I know we can go measure-by-measure, or spend all day making markers. But what if I just want to RW back a few beats in front of the current bar?

23. How about the simple ability to ENABLE WRITE AUTOMATION while already in playback?!

24. Some kind of indicator on controls that already have automation? (check out REASON for this feature). Highlighting or circling the control with a green colour to show it already has automation? (of course, this will be user optional in the prefs.)

25. More automation modes please!! (ie: Touch, Latch, Overwrite, Jump, Skip and Hop).

26. The ability to move more than one track at a time with the mouse(in the track view window). (note: NOT audio clips, but actual tracks) without having to go through the whole long process of Select multiple tracks, Track->Sort, choose selected and ascending/descending etc...Just make it a simple mouse drag.

27. Simple Waveform drawing tool (to take out 1-sample ticks etc....). Very basic, Very obvious, Very useful...please?!?!

28. A MUCH more accurate (aka: LESS WILD) scrub. Something smooth with shuttle option on single tracks.

29. The ability to assign the track name to all clips on the same track. ie: I dbl-click the track name, rename it and hit SHIFT-ENTER, and that will also rename all clips to the same name.

30. Please tell me there's a way to GROUP CLIPS in the track window? PLease!?!?! please tell me. I can't find anything in the help file.

31. A useable AUDIO POOL (like Cubase SX)!!

32. Make the GRID LINES IN THE PIANO ROLL change to the same as grid value. ie: if I select 1/8 note for grid, put some darn 1/8 note grid lines! If I select 1/16 notes for grid value, then show some 1/16th note grid lines!

33. Give us at least a LITTLE flexibility with fades on audio clips!!! (ie: more than 3 basic fade curves, the ability to use points in a fade-curve option window etc)

34. Please make it possible to turn on/off the audio metronome during playback.

35. Make the MUTE and SOLO buttons on audio track layers a little bigger please?

36. Make the Maximum Zoom Out REALLY ZOOM OUT! I have 45 tracks, and I want to see ALL of them. Not just the top 16....zoom out should actually ZOOM OUT. Thanks.

37. When adjusting volume envelope points on automation, can you also display the DIFFERENCE in db? and not just the actual value (ie: I move a point from -8dB to -6dB, can you display a +2dB tooltip too?)

38. Make it possible to move crossfades between audio. ie: I x-fade two audio clips, and after listening I realize I need to move the x-fade a little farther. Let me just grab the x-fade and slide it anywhere I want.

39. Make the dB range in the Sonitus EQ selectable? I don't think many people here ever use 15dB of cut/boost when eq-ing, so perhaps having the default at 6dB range makes more sense? BUT, also add a drop down to the EQ to select 12, and 15dB range too? Will make it easier when changing EQs with the graphic points. Just an idear!

40. Treat the bus channels more like regular mixer channels! ie: we should be able to Actively SELECT bus channels (the same way as tracks), and ALSO MAKE THE SELECTED BUS CHANNEL SHOW UP ON MY MCU'S SELECT LIGHT TOO PLEASE!!!

41. another 'inspector' type of window for showing audio clip information (ie: total clip length, start time, end time etc..) in user selectable time bases, ie: ms, samples, beats, smpte time etc... IN REAL TIME. Not some kind of right-click>show info window...

42. The abilty to 'split' control surfaces (ie: Mackie Control + XT) into two devices. So we can have audio tracks show on the Mackie XT, while showing Bus channels on the Main MCU!

43. Make the 'un-solo ALL' button work for busses too please! Please do not treat the busses so differently from the regular audio channels (ie: allow selectable busses, allow mute/solo automation etc).

44. When dragging/dropping midi or audio clips from explorer to the track view, please make it a more obvious display of where we're dropping them? (ie: make a long vertical bar pointer at the beginning of the clip along with a tooltip stating current bar position?!)

45. Allow us to select multiple tracks/channels in the console view (for easier output routing when changing several channels at once. IE: I want to see all the current tracks that route to FF800 Analog 1 ONLY and re-route them to FF800 Analog 3 etc).

46. Capture last take as recording ( if you just play around with your song on a miditrack whithout being in record mode, you can press a key and Voilá what you just played is now recorded, like magic. Logic and Cubase have the feature since years ago)

47. Legato "quantize" Your midi notes will be shortened or lengthend( is that a word?) to just reach the next midinote and not overlapping

48. Don't let Roland take your programmers away from working on this list.

49. The ability to change project sample rates WITHOUT having to start a new project and re-import the tracks and re-create the busses and the mix levels etc.

50. Have an 'auto mute' option for track layers. When I record onto a single track with track layers enabled, please mute the previous layer when recording a new take. Instead of having the user try to click that dang super-duper-small mute button on the layer. This should be an option in the prefs.

51. introduce a track delay positive or negative, I've found only Time+ for midi, But Audio?

52. Pen tool to draw out single sample clicks etc...!!!

I'd like to see the development and inclusion of Sonar bass & guitar plugins that rival AmpegSVX and AmpliTube! That would be a great selling point by itself!

Mine:

1 - Rework the wave drawing system completely! C'mon guys, it's been eight versions already, get this right. I want the wave drawings to be saved with the project folder and be there forever, I don't want a unified folder that doesn't work well. Every time I open a big project (24 audio tracks recorded for four hours straight, for example) it starts recomputing the waves. It is SUPREMELY annoying to wait for 5 mins every time I open a large project. And enlarging the cache size in aud.ini is no good either, it makes it all crazy and most waves draw out as empty...

2 - Easy trim buttons, as in Vegas, instead of slip-editing with the mouse I want to be able to snap the clip's start/end point at my cursor position

3 - Auto Trim: automatically slip-edit to the beginning/end of a previously-set threshold of audio data

4 - Make FF and REW buttons that actually fast-forward and rewind: just for complete MMC implementation, I want to be able to fast-forward and rewind with my hardware buttons

5 - Make the track templates accept folders! It's rather tiring, after bringing in a template of a drums recording setup for example, to move it into a folder and naming it every time you start a new take!

6 - Built in Wave editor / pencil tool for existing track view

7 - Soloing a drum map soloes all of it's associated instruments as well

8 - It'd be nice if V-Vocal stopped crashing so much, and giving that retched "Invalid V-Vocal Data Detected" message every time you save it in a complex project and then try to load back again.

9 - And most importantly for me - Add support for HUI protocol remote mode (so we'll finally be able to use Yamaha digital mixers). No, scratch that, I don't want to wait for Sonar 8 to get that, that should be added to 7.03!! That should have been added years ago to Sonar 4. And VERY annoying that it is still not implemented!

To every bird it's own tree

I love it when these threads come up.

• Audio Latency Slider toolbar
  
• Key-bind Clip-gain envelope
  
• Asset Management tools/view!! MIDI, audio, presets, ideas, meta tags, libraries... it's time!
  
• GLOBAL fx-bin bypass (at least multiple selects)
  
• fx-chain presets
  
• smarter bounce (selecting a MIDI track also "knows" it's soft-synth)
  
• Bring us P5's arpeggiator
  
• A better "archive" or "bundle" option. Preferably one that consoldiates our audio AND our presets and soft synth patches (and banks) so we can have a true portable archive of a
• project that includes all the sound sources
  
• Rubber-band track widget height please
  
• A "regions" or "playlist" function, either with markers ("smart" markers?) or some new function. Just like Play Order Track in Cubase
  

I'm pretty easy, I'm not looking for whiz-bang innovations, just some small steady improvements to refine the already great product.

- A virtual Jupiter 8
- A virtual Super Jupiter
- A virtual Juno
- A virtial Super-JX
- A virtual D-50
- A virtual SH-101
- A virtual TB-303

Some of them are readily availeble as freeware VSTi's. Haven't used the real hardware so can't judge them as such but google and it might be worth a try.

Personally I would like a midi-strummer effect (kinda like the one in FL Studio) to make it faster making guitar strums etc in the piano roll.

Well .. . . . .

My favorite yearnings for the last several versions:

Score enhancement - Before we get into an all out war on Sonar's audio ware vs. notation, I'm just wishing for a better import/export. Perhaps Musicxl or direct import into something. I use SmartScore and Sibelius, but unless I miss my guess, Sonar seems to be leaning toward a partner with Finale. Regardless, I just want to compose in Sonar and be able to print easily either in Sonar (preferred) or another program. I just should go smoother.

Loop explorer - With the latest MIDI enhancements, how'd they ignore this? It can't be that hard to preview MIDI loops.

Back to Staff View, There's been a lot of people wishing for "fixes" on triplets and such, but how about making this pane work like the rest? Why can't I scroll down the tracks with my mouse wheel? Also, I use the Staff View to display the words for people to sing along during recording ('course if I could get a readable lead sheet . . .) I'd love to see a "karaoke" type feature that would fix the cursor at one point and let the score travel instead of the "follow and jump" mode that it has currently. I'd like to see that also in Track View (maybe a lock on the F3 key????)

All in all, I do applaud Cake's determination to improve each version in some dramatic AND useful way. I've never regretted any upgrade I've bought. Looking forward to S8. 7-8 months can be soon enough!

Ed

A pen to edit the waveform.

Mute previous take when using track layers, I would have upgraded to Sonar 7 if it had added that one feature.
A 'Bypass All Effects Bin's' button. Handy when you have to go back and re-record or add a track.
I would add my vote for an Improved GUI, that's the one thing I miss coming from Audition which I think has much better workflow/user interface.
Along with the suggestion to give a warning when multiple tracks are being deleted.

Simple interface for time-stretch/pitch-shift based on Radius algorhythm.

being able to extract transient info from Midi files in Audiosnap. Intsead of having to render a drum midi file into an audio file first, it would be nice to directly extract timing and velocity from the drum midi file.

a P A U S E B U T T O N

obligatory per version...

F@KKER

ORIGINAL: dewdman42

I wish The GUI had just a hair more 3Dness to it. About to the same degree as Cubase3X is. C4 went flat also from what I have seen.

I actually preferred the flatter lighter colored Toolbar Buttons in S6 compared to what's in S7. I wish they'd make the Toolbar Buttons customizable in S8, so the user could revert back to the older style S6 buttons or more 3D for folks who prefer it that way.