FastBikerBoy

Smart tool: Double click or Alt click to add note; Click on Edges to resize notes; Click in the middle to drag notes up or down. Click on top edge to change velocity; Click on Note to select; Left click and drag to select several notes; Left click on background to deselect all notes; Double click on note to open its properties; Right click on note to delete it; Alt+Click to split note; Shift + Right click to mute note; Right click & drag to erase multiple notes;

Switch to TV view to work on audio clips - fade in/out slip edit, work on MIDI clips, automation, or audio transients without changing tools.

V8 Draw tool: ceases to function outside PRV.

Need I continue?

I am not arguing that the Draw Tool was better than the current Smart Tool! (Well except for simple clicking to draw notes) If anything, the Smart Tool is closely based on the old Draw Tool. I am just pointing out that the claims that were made previously in this thread that re-assigning the key-bindings could restore previous work-flows is absolutely incorrect. I am also pointing out that the other tools besides the Smart Tool really have been dumbed down. (I am also making a few sides points on the way).

As I have said many times, I like the Smart Tool though I do think it needs a little tweaking.

UnderTow

UnderTow

mike_mccue


Yes, I fully agree Jim... I was shocked to recently learn that Cakewalk staffed it's former Director of Product Management position with someone who had a total of 8 years experience after earning a Master's Degree.  That sounds impetuous to me but then I learned that the person was actually a former "Vice  President" at yet another company. A position held merely 3 years after graduating from college.

Being an expert in some technical field does not preclude the fact that it takes many years to amass life experience and, as you suggest, generalized wisdom. Heck, I'm still working on that stuff every day.

Having the realization that Cakewalk, the corporation, depends on such experience to guide the development of product explains, to me, why I have observed all the symptoms I have come to complain about for the past 5 years.

If that worries you, you might be a little worried about the X1's Product Manager's previous experience: http://www.linkedin.com/in/zylervega

It seems that what amounts to a bit of helpdesk experience as a side job while studying is enough to become the Product Manager of Cakewalk's flagship product. It seems a bit of a responsibility jump if you ask me.

UnderTow

Guys - I would ask that we not make potentially unfortunate assumptions about people we don't know and situations that we have little or no"on the ground" knowledge of. Zyler is one Product Manager (and incidentally is an intelligent person with a keen analytical mind). But regardless, and more importantly...SONAR's development strategy and product management is done by a pretty wide group with a wide array of talents and experience. It's not just one guy. So I would urge you not to let any one person's apparent experience worry you too much when it comes to our beloved flagship DAW.

UnderTow

FastBikerBoy

Smart tool: Double click or Alt click to add note; Click on Edges to resize notes; Click in the middle to drag notes up or down. Click on top edge to change velocity; Click on Note to select; Left click and drag to select several notes; Left click on background to deselect all notes; Double click on note to open its properties; Right click on note to delete it; Alt+Click to split note; Shift + Right click to mute note; Right click & drag to erase multiple notes;

Switch to TV view to work on audio clips - fade in/out slip edit, work on MIDI clips, automation, or audio transients without changing tools.

V8 Draw tool: ceases to function outside PRV.

Need I continue?

I am not arguing that the Draw Tool was better than the current Smart Tool! (Well except for simple clicking to draw notes) If anything, the Smart Tool is closely based on the old Draw Tool. I am just pointing out that the claims that were made previously in this thread that re-assigning the key-bindings could restore previous work-flows is absolutely incorrect. I am also pointing out that the other tools besides the Smart Tool really have been dumbed down. (I am also making a few sides points on the way).

As I have said many times, I like the Smart Tool though I do think it needs a little tweaking.

UnderTow

Posted before reading this UT. IMO the other tools haven't been dumbed down, they've been rendered useless and maybe that's just semantics in which case I agree. I NEVER used the draw tool in X1 as stated above. I NEVER use any of the Tools other than the Smart Tool in X1. Doesn't make that right it's just a personal observation.

I also agree that with a couple of tweaks the Smart Tool can indeed become REALLY Smart.

Gosh Undertow, trust you to be homing in on someone's credits...

UnderTow


People are misunderstanding my addressing of very specific points being made with something else so I will just state that I think things could have been done a bit more elegantly while keeping more users happy in the process, and leave it at that as far as the old tools are concerned.

I also believe mistakes were made when designing the new tools. (Separate select and move tools instead of a single grab tool being an obvious example).

UnderTow

I actually thought a Grab tool that combined the two would be good. It was actually discussed, but some wanted to keep them separate for now in case further functionality was added to the "dumb" tools. We figured most people would use the Smart Tools nearly all the time anyway. So I think in the future you'll either see more customization added back in to the "dumb" tools or you'll see the Select and Move perhaps merge into a tool of average intelligence.

UnderTow

Brandon Ryan [Cakewalk
]


Guys - I would ask that we not make potentially unfortunate assumptions about people we don't know and situations that we have little or no"on the ground" knowledge of. Zyler is one Product Manager (and incidentally is an intelligent person with a keen analytical mind).

I am not doubting his intelligence. I was just questioning his experience.

No I know - and I apologize if I inadvertently made an insinuation. I was just saying that sometimes people's aptitude can potentially make up for lack of experience. A "quick study", etc.

But regardless, and more importantly...SONAR's development strategy and product management is done by a pretty wide group with a wide array of talents and experience. It's not just one guy. So I would urge you not to let any one person's apparent experience worry you too much when it comes to our beloved flagship DAW.

A post in the past had made me believe he was the X1 Product Manager. Thanks for clarifying.

UnderTow

Sure thing. I thought it needed clarification. As SONAR is our flagship DAW and our main product, we have a number of hands on deck in various capacities.

ShermanSmelville
Gosh Undertow, trust you to be homing in on someone's credits...

A healthy dose of irony for someone (undertow, not you Sherman) who refuses to mention any of his own credits and instead says his knowledge should speak for itself. I'm surprised his post didn't get the thread locked or worse.

...wicked

ShermanSmelville
Gosh Undertow, trust you to be homing in on someone's credits...

A healthy dose of irony for someone (undertow, not you Sherman) who refuses to mention any of his own credits and instead says his knowledge should speak for itself. I'm surprised his post didn't get the thread locked or worse.

I don't "refuse to mention" my credits. I think they are irrelevant in a technical discussion. And I never said my knowledge should speak for itself. I said that facts and the logic of arguments should speak for themselves when discussing technical things. At that time we were discussing how a compressor works. Did you ever bother doing the very simple test I proposed? You are eager to jump to conclusions but too lazy to actually check things. Enough said...

Anyway, last time I check I do not manage anything at Cakewalk. I don't even have any direct influence on anything that happens at Cakewalk. A Cakewalk Product manager on the other hand is a different story. Brandon clarified things now.

You and ShermanSmelville are just taking cheap pot shots. I guess that in itself says enough...

UnderTow

jm24

I like the note value not changing based upon the last note touched. Entering notes in Staff view in 8.5 is annoying at best when needing to constantly delete notes of a different value than what I am wanting to add. Just because I just touched a quarter note does not mean I want to enter a quarter note.  Definitely need a toggle for this for those guys that like such.

Out of curiosity, would it bother you as much if the default note length only changed when you change an existing note's length (but not when just clicking on or selecting a note)? So somewhere in between X1 and previous versions' behaviour.

The reason I ask is that it might be nice to have this as one of the options if this behaviour could be set by users. So then you get these three options:
- Default Note Length never changes automatically. Users set it through he HUD or Control Bar setting.
- Default Note Length changes when a user changes an existing note's length.
- Default Note Length always changes to the last selected note's length or when changing the length of an existing note.

UnderTow

jm24


Yo Brandon

Is the only underlying assumption for left-click behavior to be  consistant with Windows?  

Or::::
Is it assumed that users will more often be editing rather than inserting new notes?

This sorta makes sense.

I think it was mainly for consistency with Windows and expected behavior. But it was s pretty heated debate if I recall. I personally prefer ALT for lasso selection and a simple left click for draw when it comes to the Smart Tool's behavior.

But, the reason we may want to use the draw tool is so we do not have to hold the ALT key.

I can certainly understand that.

Holding the ALT key for many minutes while adding notes makes my finger unhappy. And it makes my hand have to be in a awkward postitiion to use other keys.

Double clicking if fine for a couple of notes, but long term?

Right. I prefer to add notes with the simple single click and use ALT for selections. Some people don't agree - which is why my number one wish for the Smart Tool is an option to toggle this behavior.

====

I like the note value not changing based upon the last note touched. Entering notes in Staff view in 8.5 is annoying at best when needing to constantly delete notes of a different value than what I am wanting to add. Just because I just touched a quarter note does not mean I want to enter a quarter note.  Definitely need a toggle for this for those guys that like such.

=======================

What was the assumption/argument made for removing 1-click/1-keystroke to change note duration value keys/buttons?

Is the only way to have 1-stroke note-duration value change to remap the keyboard?

J

jm24


Anybody???

What was the assumption/argument made for removing 1-click/1-keystroke to change note duration value keys/buttons?

Is the only way to have 1-stroke note-duration value change to remap the keyboard?

J

I don't think it is too much trouble to reassign some keys for that. At least if I understand you correctly. Personally, if I wanted this under direct single key access I would probably assign the number keys above the qwerty keyboard and re-assign ScreenSets to keys with modifiers. I am more likely to want to change default note length than to want to change ScreenSets (If I ever do which is questionable...)

UnderTow

In the old Sonar I never switched tool, NEVER, because I could do everything I needed with only one tool. You could perhaps say that the tool was “smart”.

In X1a however the most efficient way is to switch between two tools. Because adding notes is the most frequent action for most composers it should be done with a single left click, and the only tool that allows you to do that at the moment is the draw-tool, so that should be one of the two tools you use. In old Sonar you could use Alt as a modifier and get the select-tool. Also you could use the middle mouse-button to delete, and you could also resize and change velocity with the draw-tool, and right click would give you the note properties, so you could pretty much do everything with the draw tool.

With X1 you can't do these things with the draw-tool anymore, except delete notes, so you need another tool, and that should of course be the smart-tool.

One shouldn't too hastily draw the conclusion however that one tool for everything is always faster than changing between multiple tools. There are many situations where the opposite is true. For example, in the old days I used Alt as a modifier to change the draw-tool into a select-tool and the new smart-tool works much the same way, only the other way around. If it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to assume that the draw-tool and the select-tool are the two tools that are most frequently used amongst most composers, then you'll also have to consider the inefficiency of the left hand being occupied holding down a key all the time that one of those tools are used.

Some intelligently placed keyboard shortcuts to switch between the two tools can, in many instances, be a better solution. It doesn't take much more time to press a shortcut key and letting go of it than pressing a modifier-key and holding it, but only with the former approach is your left hand completely free to do other things in the meanwhile. The keyboard shortcuts should preferably be in a place that is near to the modifier-keys so you don't have to move your hands back and forth. The F-keys are perhaps a little bit far away.

I'm pretty sure this is the fastest method at the moment, if you're using X1 that is, but when they make the tools more customizable that will probably change. For the moment I have to conclude that the old tools were more efficient than the new ones, because the old tools could do pretty much everything that the new ones can, but the old ones were customizable and the new ones aren't. I think X1 has to be seen as a work in progress, that isn't the perfect DAW, but in many ways is a huge step in the right direction, and in other ways many small steps backwards. I think the best approach for Cakewalk now is to spend the next few years working on all the small details that are wrong with X1 and not spending their time and resources with adding all the sexy content that we have enough of anyway. X1 was marketed as being all about work-flow, but what usually happens when you create a whole new work-flow paradigm is that in many ways the work-flow gets poorer because you don't see the consequences of all those changes you just made, especially since the old work-flow had developed over many years to become pretty streamlined. I think it is during the next two or three incarnations of Sonar that we should expect to see the real work-flow improvements. Hopefully...

P.S.
Those people, whoever they are, that made the windows-consistency argument for not using single left click to add notes could not have been composers, and their opinions should therefore not be counted. Tell them that next time, Brandon.

UnderTow
I don't "refuse to mention" my credits.

If I may paraphrase you: I beg to differ.

Did you ever bother doing the very simple test I proposed?

Nope, I did not. And you know what, I don't know if anybody else did either. Just like I don't always click on the links you send out. Ain't freedom grand?

You and ShermanSmelville are just taking cheap pot shots. 

You mean "cheap" like searching a Cake employee's linked in profile and assuming that's the grand total of his CV, then coming on the Cake forums and making an accusation he's not qualified for his job? That kind of cheap? Because that's pretty good, I wouldn't give myself that much credit.

EDIT: oh forget it, it's not worth any of our time I'll delete the rest.

Those people, whoever they are, that made the windows-consistency argument for not using single left click to add notes could not have been composers, and their opinions should therefore not be counted.

 
Really?   I can't be the only person that primarily uses a controller to record MIDI parts and the PRV to edit them...   The current left-click selection behavior is ideal for me for exactly that reason - I spend much more time selecting notes than drawing.   But if the scenario was reversed then yeah, I would certainly select a different tool rather than hold down a modifier key all the time.    So I'm all for the option that Brandon mentioned.     But to imply that composers always manually enter notes in the PRV doesn't seem fair, or entirely accurate.
 
 

You should be able to configure it anyway you want.
 
Similar to the way you can have either the left side or right side be highlighted when split. I prefer to have it on the right as most likely I want to delete it. But there may be times when I only want to work with the left side, so having that option is great. The same thing for the left delete / right delete discussion. Wouldn't it be cool to open up the tool HUD and be able to customize it anyway we wanted?