Glyn Barnes

mmorgan
 Just last week I saw a reference in a DAW manufacturers video that stated that studies have shown that keyboard shortcuts can increase your efficiency by 400%.

How do they work that out? Moving a mouse to a button (or even an item in a menu) and clicking is hardly the major time consuming operation, a short cut is faster assuming your hands are already at the keyboard. But even if its four times faster the minuscule amount of time saved would only be significant in continuously repeated operations where you do not need to think about what your are doing. Most of the time taken in, say, a cut and past operation is thinking what you want to past, where you want to paste it and why.
 
Shortcuts may be more efficient, but a 400% increase in efficiency come on, (the statement must be out of context). Does anybody really think you can record a song in a quarter of the time using short cuts over a mouse? If the statement was save 5 to10 minutes in a working day it would probably be closer to the truth.
 
IMHO both the case for the advantages of short cuts and for their inconveniences are being overstated in this thread.

I could agree that wihout shortcuts my production could be down 400%
I think if I look at it that way it makes sense.
I agree it does seem to be a large number but I cant imagine working without shortcuts.

Bristol_Jonesey

vintagevibe

Bristol_Jonesey

jscomposer


+1 on the customized control bar. I guess I'm old school, but I used the save icon a lot. I personally hate keyboard shortcuts, it's a PITA with one hand. Cakewalk is so gung-ho on making X2 look pretty, but has left the real issues in the dust.

I respectfully disagree.

Most 2 fingered shortcuts are possible using just one hand, and several 3 fingered options as well.

Using a keyboard with a guitar in you hands or at a drum set is the least efficient way to do it.   Using a keyboard also requires looking away from the screen.  Surely you can accept that different people have different needs.

Of course I can.


But, whichever method you adopt you will at some point have to remove hand from instrument, then grab mouse, navigate to the button/menu item you want and then click it. If a menu item is buried in the menu hierarchy then that's potentially several mouse clicks = inefficiency.






The only practical way to overcome this would be to have a dedicated button for every function. That doesn't seem to be a good way forward.

No...the way forward in customizable toolbars.

I agree it does seem to be a large number but I cant imagine working without shortcuts.

 
Me neither...   The thought makes me cringe.  
 
 
However.... a few of the guys that work for me doing software tech support on a daily basis are big-time "all mouse with an occasional key stroke" people.   I can unquestionably state that I can navigate around sooo much faster that it's sometimes frustrating to watch - I just want to take over and get through the steps...    But that's me, it's not everyone.   I may not really understand it, but I get it.
 

Keni

Jlien X



And the reason why I think Duckbar isn't the solution for everyone is....there are many Sonar users all over the world who cannot read English 

Just as a point of info... Duckbar's author is (I believe) German and he does have it available in a few (?) other languages...

Keni

Oh really? I didn't know that. But maybe not in Japanese (I could be wrong).

Duckbar's author is Finnish but his band has German name.

I will say this once then im out,
the only reason I think a save button could be helpful is because of this:

when one saves work, its a huge deal, we want a visual to know our work is saved, we want to see this button being pushed/highlighted as we press it.
I happen to use control +S to save all the time except for when I exit sonar or need a visual on a save, that's when I use the toolbar, because I want to see that button being pressed.
I want to know for sure I have seen it pressed.

so for the amount of time I use it like this, I see no reason for it.
but then again. im only an opinion.

The name of the project in the title bar changes from having an * (changed) to not having an * on save, so the visual cue already exists.