Step Sequencer Newbie Question

In all of my years messing with Sonar (Cakewalk v3) I have never used the step sequencer, other than to fire it up and see what the fuss was all about.  Now I am contemplating an experiment of the Shepard tone.  I need three tracks separated by an octave each.  That seems like an opportunity to use the Step Sequencer.  
 
Do I really have to hand put in the note numbers?  Isn't there an auto fill of some sorts?   

Hmm, I must say I'm a bit confused. Do you mean you want the sequence to cover 2 octaves or you want to duplicate the original sequence an octave up or down?
 
As to hand entering the sequence, yes it is manual as you have to select the note duration, enter rests where needed, etc. but you can use a keyboard to enter the actual note.
 
Like all other features, it has it's place. It is great for arpeggios or for long sequences of the same note duration. Prevents some cleanup or quantization after the fact.
 
As to moving the sequence up an octave you would use the piano roll view either to select and move or copy, paste and then move to duplicate it an octave.

There is no "painting" in the step record. In that situation I would set the snapping in the PRV to be whatever duration and then mouse click the notes in. Drawing a line or something in the PRV may work but I doubt it. How is it going to know if you want a c natural or c sharp or a# or all of them?
 
There may be some feature in Sonar that does what you want but I'm not aware of it.

space_cowboy
 
I only want the midi note numbers in the little boxes that say 36 37 38... to auto fill.  
 

There's two parts I'm not clear on?
What do you mean by auto fill. Do you mean 'Right click the row and select fill every 2,3,4,5,6',  or 'take what you programed in PRV and convert to step sequencer', or 'something else'?
 
And when you only want certain note numbers, do you mean you don't want to see the other rows? Which can be achieved by deleting the unwanted rows, or by bouncing the clip, then converting it back to step sequencer.
 
 
 

I don't know enough about the SS to give good advice but I do know you can create this in Midi, which might be easier using the Select tool with snap engaged to the correct duration.
then right click on the clip and choose "Convert to step sequencer clip".
You can also reverse the process the same way by choosing "Convert to midi clip".

By the way, this forced me to figure out how to use IMGUR.  Any other hostings that are good?
 

It's useful for sequencing drums however I find myself doing my main editing in MIDI mode.  I plan on getting Battery and Kontakt again at some stage so I could see it supplementing the features without it being open all of the time, so you can easily trigger samples. Almost wish Matrix mode was like that.
 
 

you can use both, PRV and SS.
Do the bulk of notes in PRV then convert the clip to a step sequencer clip to do velocity changes.