[Hidden agenda alert: I think the topic of using Take Lanes as Layers would make a great article for my Sonar column in Sound on Sound magazine, as there seems to be confusion/controversy around the subject. So, the purpose of this thread is not to start a flame war about Take Lanes; we have enough of those. The purpose is to offer solutions to those who want Take Lanes to work as much like Layers as possible. I believe that with a few exceptions this is possible, and without complicated workarounds. 
 
HOWEVER, before writing this up, I want to make sure my thinking is correct. I am hoping that people who want to use Take Lanes as Layers will read this and 1) verify that what I'm suggesting works, 2) if possible, propose additional solutions or workarounds I haven't addressed that make Take Lanes seem more like Layers. I'm just trying to be helpful here...as well as gather material for another column.]
 
While the new features in Take Lanes were designed for comping applications involving a particular workflow, as far as I can tell they can do pretty much everything you could do with Layers. I say "as far as I can tell" because I didn't use Layers all that much, but I think I've found the key to using Take Lanes as Layers:
 
After recording your Lanes/Layers, DON'T USE THE COMPING TOOLS FOR EDITING unless you actually want to comp using the workflow for which Take Lanes were intended.
 
If you want to start splitting clips, right-click on the Edit Tool button and select the Split tool. In the case of parts that aren't played to a click, you can split wherever you want; if you select multiple clips and split, they'll all split in the same place.
 
If you want to edit clips, right-click on the Edit Tool and select Edit. DON'T use the crossfade tool that's optimized for comping. You can do all of the following edits (and probably more) to individual clips:
 

• All fade-in and fade-out options
• All slip edit functions
• All slip edit functions involving fade-in/fade-out
• Time-stretching (e.g., slip-edit while holding down Ctrl)
• Slide clips in the Lane's time line
• Use a Lane's Edit Filter to do clip automation Gain or Pan
• Play back multiple clips simultaneously by unmuting muted clips (the "I'm layering sounds and want all the takes to play back through the same FX bin and/or go to the same send" scenario)
• Insert clip FX
• Delete all muted clips
• Delete all empty Lanes
• Flatten everything into its own Lane, which you can then drag into a track if you want to do track-type treatments

Note: The Smart Tool will also do many things the Edit Tool does, but I haven't investigated all the possibilities yet. For example, I know you can alt-click to split with the Smart Tool, but the tool has to be positioned in the correct part of the waveform or it won't seem to work.
 
Caution #1: Be careful about what clips are selected. For example if three clips are selected and you apply a fade-out to one of them, all three will have the same fade-out applied.
 
Caution #2: In some editing scenarios you may need to go back and forth between the Select and Edit (and possible the Mute) tools. The function keys speed up this process.
 
Here are some things you CAN'T do with Take Lanes (at least I haven't figured out how):
 

• Do automatic crossfades within a Lane, because clips within the same lane can't overlap. Workaround: Create a new Take Lane, move the clip you want to crossfade into it, and do a manual fade in/fade out for the overlapping clips. [Edit: Actually you can do crossfades on the Comp clip in the parent track if the Take Lanes aren't showing - see Brundlefly's post #4 below]
• Create a clip Region FX and apply Melodyne. Workaround: Drag the clip into a standard track, apply Melodyne, then drag back into the Layer.
• Add Automation envelopes (other than clip automation) within Lanes.

 
Without using the Comping tools, edits are done manually and Take Lanes behave more like Layers. With the Comping tools, a lot of the comping process is automated (taking the place of the Isolate function in Layers, which was the best option at the time for comping). Perhaps it's the default to the automated comping processes that's keeping people from using Take Lanes like Layers.
 
Caveat: As I said, I didn't use Layers that much so there may be some Layer-specific features important to people that I'm missing. If so, there may be ways around any limitations that would make the article even more useful.

This subject reminds me of the audio view transition... Good thread Craig.

Excellent idea, Craig. As you've pointed out, and I've also mentioned several times, staying away from the Comping tool is one key. I think there are also key differences between the way pre-takelane versions re-used layers when recording to different (i.e. non-overlapping) parts of a project (with or without looping), which seems to be a significant part of the discomfort with take lanes, and can only be worked around by dragging clips to the desired lane(s) between takes.
 
Scratch that last thought; I just checked in X1, and the behavior is the same - the most recently recorded lane/layer gets re-used when you record to another section of the project, and new lanes are added from there as needed when loop-recording. so either way, you'd have to drag clips (down in X3, up in X1 where lane order is reversed) to consolidate lanes/layers.
 
EDIT: Hmmm... strikethrough font not as obvious after posting as it is while editing.

Anderton
 
Here are some things you CAN'T do with Take Lanes (at least I haven't figured out how):
 

• Do automatic crossfades within a Lane, because clips within the same lane can't overlap. Workaround: Create a new Take Lane, move the clip you want to crossfade into it, and do a manual fade in/fade out for the overlapping clips.

This one's a little weird, because you can do it if lanes are not showing when you create the overlap, and the Ref. Guide says the same will happen with lanes showing. I've reported this to the Bakers. Should be possible in Blend editing mode.
 
From the X3 Ref. Guide on page 384 under "Using Take Lanes":
 
"Note 2: If the Track view Options > Auto Crossfade option is enabled, SONAR adds acrossfade between any newly overlapped clips that are on the same Take lane."

brundlefly
Excellent idea, Craig. As you've pointed out, and I've also mentioned several times, staying away from the Comping tool is one key. I think there are also key differences between the way pre-takelane versions re-used layers when recording to different (i.e. non-overlapping) parts of a project (with or without looping), which seems to be a significant part of the discomfort with take lanes, and can only be worked around by dragging clips to the desired lane(s) between takes.
 
Scratch that last thought; I just checked in X1, and the behavior is the same - the most recently recorded lane/layer gets re-used when you record to another section of the project, and new lanes are added from there as needed when loop-recording. so either way, you'd have to drag clips (down in X3, up in X1 where lane order is reversed) to consolidate lanes/layers.

Agreed, in this case Take Lanes work the same way as Layers. Here's how I deal with the issue.
 
Suppose I recorded several Layers in one track at the beginning of the song and wanted to record more Layers of the same instrument toward the end of the song:
 
1. Clone the first track, but without Events. Do the loop recording for the next section in the clone track.
2. Comp the first part using the data in the first track and the second part using the data in the second track.
3. Select both tracks, then bounce to the first track (or to a new track, it doesn't matter; but if the first track is set up with effects, sends, etc., it makes more sense to bounce to the first track).
 
All the parts now end up bounced in the first track's highest Take Lane.
 
The reason this works for me is I don't go back and forth among sections when comping, I comp one then do another. So it doesn't matter that they're on separate tracks.

My suggestion in one of the threads where this came up was to continue recording in the same track and:
 
- Lasso each new set of takes and Shift+drag them down to the original set of lanes
- Right-click the comp clip and Remove Empty Take Lanes.
 
It seems to me this is not a flow-busting amount of housekeeping to do between takes.

Can you import audio files into take lanes? I usually track outside the box and import the audio files into Sonar for mixing. Thanks.
 
Rocky

brundlefly
My suggestion in one of the threads where this came up was to continue recording in the same track and:
 
- Lasso each new set of takes and Shift+drag them down to the original set of lanes
- Right-click the comp clip and Remove Empty Take Lanes.
 
It seems to me this is not a flow-busting amount of housekeeping to do between takes.

I'm with you on the shift+drag if you want to keep takes in the same general lanes; it's not onerous. However I don't think Remove Empty Take Lanes would help much, though because the lanes for the second set of Takes get added to the existing takes. There aren't really any empty lanes; if there are empty lanes in one group of takes, that's because the lanes are occupied in other takes.
 
I'll check into the crossfade thing in more detail later on, I haven't really looked into what happens if the Take Lanes are folded up and you crossfade in the main track.

Great idea, but if I may suggest a slightly different approach. Instead of "Using lanes as layers" how about stepping back a bit and having an article on "Editing using lanes in Sonar X3".  This opens it up to interest from others who may not have ever used a layer but who are new to DAWs or coming from other DAWs and interested in how efficient editing is in Sonar.  
 
I am trying very hard to learn new methods to make X3 work for me, and appreciate the ideas posted above.  However I still find some very basic things hard.  For example, in layers if I wanted to replace a flubbed snare hit, I could easily copy and paste one from another section into a new layer, line it up with the one I wanted to replace (zooming in and out and moving the new one as necessary until the timing was right) and then trim out the old hit in the first layer.  I can't for the life of me figure out how to do this with lanes.  I can copy and paste fine, and put the new hit into a new lane so I can use the old one as a reference.  But pasting immediately hides the overlapping section of the first lane so I can't use it as a reference.  If I drag the edge of that clip to see the old hit, it disappears again as soon as I move the copied one.  Perhaps there is a way around this, but it is just one example where I still struggle with basic editing in lanes.   

neirbod
I can copy and paste fine, and put the new hit into a new lane so I can use the old one as a reference.  But pasting immediately hides the overlapping section of the first lane so I can't use it as a reference.  If I drag the edge of that clip to see the old hit, it disappears again as soon as I move the copied one.

 
I'm not understanding the problem exactly. If the copied hit is in a parallel lane, you should be able to line it up in advance and then just Shift+drag it to the other lane (Shift preserves timing). Since SONAR doesn't allow same-lane overlaps, it will automatically slip-edit the original flubbed hit out of the way. Done.