View Issue Details
| ID | Project | Category | View Status | Date Submitted | Last Update |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0001460 | ardour | features | public | 2007-02-03 16:36 | 2007-02-05 23:05 |
| Reporter | kobel | Assigned To | |||
| Priority | normal | Severity | feature | Reproducibility | always |
| Status | new | Resolution | open | ||
| Summary | 0001460: request re. moved audio files missing in session | ||||
| Description | if audio files have been moved from where ardour expects them to be, can a silent track (greyed out) be placed in the timeline where the original session audio file once was, and perhaps labelled with the original file name (for easy reference since dont always remember exactly what was in session). this silent block could then be replaced by the original file loaded in by user to recreate session as was. thanks! | ||||
| Additional Information | paul recommend3d i put this request in | ||||
| Tags | No tags attached. | ||||
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Chapter 10 of the Pro Tools Reference Guide goes into a bit of detail about what they do in this situation. I believe this is approximately what they do: Each time a audio file is added to the session a hashing function is used to generate a hash value associated with the file(which acts as a unique identifier for the file). Then when a session file is loaded and references audio files that can't be located it brings up a dialog asking the user how they want to handle the situation. I recall that at least one of those options is to automatically find those missing files, would that work in your situation? |
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the hashing function sounds simple, but i'm just a heavy user, no coder!@ automatic finding dialogue would be good option, and perhaps would also be useful to be informed of the file name of missing file and then browse for it via this dialogue yourself (I usually know where i've put the file that i had to move: either for limited drive space reasons, or for regrouping session-related audio files for more conveniently backing up session); and if user doesnt fix the association to the particular file on session-opening, then a ghost is created in the timeline in the position that file was, so not to lose the place in the song that the audio ought to be, later if that audio file is loaded back into the session's audio region list, ardour perhaps automatically reassociates that ghost block with the reloaded audio (recognises the file as associated to that particular greyed out silent block) and the audio works without having to drag audio back in and replace ghost at correct point in timeline (so long as audio file name hasnt changed) the dialogue i think is less important than the session simply keeping some record of the position of the missing audio in the timeline in some form, plus the name of the file that was there |
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"the hashing function sounds simple, but i'm just a heavy user, no coder" Sorry for using that sort of terminology. Basically I meant that Pro Tools can find a file based on the contents of the file and not just the file name. I imagine this is very important when searching for files automatically because of there may be many files with the same name. I do think functionality should be added to support your use case, I suggested looking at what other systems like Pro Tools do because they have solved this and related problems before and there may also be some value in maintaining some sort of functional compatability. Currently ardour crashes when loading a session that references files that don't exist(bug filed). So perhaps the first step would be to fix that bug and also bring up a message dialog listing the missing files so they can be moved back to the session directory. Adding further functionality such as automatically finding those missing files can be added later? The solution you presented may be a solution as to what to do when a file cannot be located but if the file still resides somewhere on the filesystem would it be more useful for you if there was functionality to locate and re-import/"re-link" those files into the session? > the dialogue i think is less important than the session simply keeping some > record of the position of the missing audio in the timeline in some form, plus > the name of the file that was there If ardour is going to do anything automatically in response to an error/exception condition like missing files then I think it is very important to at least notify the user. |
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"Sorry for using that sort of terminology" no no, I'm sorry I cant contribute more effectively to Ardour! but I can understand a little of software architecture. I used to be a ProTools user and its way of dealing with this is basically effective. I use ardour 0.99.3 at the moment (need the stability) which doesnt crash when losing audio files but instead returns error messages and forgets the position for these missing files on the timeline, leaving the session half lost even if you reimport those files into the session. a dialogue listing the missing files on startup is good, so the user can then put those files into session directory and reopen the session (hopefully without errors), this would be a good place to start, yes; but if those files were originally elsewhere (embedded in session and not imported) then does Ardour know to look for that file both in the place expected AND the session folder? before returning an error message and ditching the timeline positions and regions of an audio file. When mixing I might embed other audio files into a session from elsewhere on a drive (other sessions etc) without putting them in the session folder, then later want to bring these into the session folder for backing up a complete session with all files together. the =content as well as name= hashing function sounds great to isolate particular files amongst those similarly named if the search was automatic "> the dialogue i think is less important than the session simply keeping some > record of the position of the missing audio "if ardour is going to do anything automatically in response to an error/exception condition like missing files then I think it is very important to at least notify the user" yes, I was jumping ahead a little tho, I was concerned about Ardour losing the timeline information related to a lost audio file (this is because with 0.99.3 the session does not crash and is still useable, but without the data for missing files), but this ProTools-like ghost file to mark the missing file's regions position on the timeline can be a luxury for some future, so for simple functionality –– user being given missing files names at opening, and Ardour checking the session's audio folder for files that it cannot find elsewhere (if was expecting to find them elsewhere i.e. session embedded audio) should work? |
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SVN revision 1424 now has support for "replacing" missing files with a "fake" silent file (nothing exists on disk). When the file shows up again, everything will continue to work. You can even edit regions that reference the missing files, and these edits will exist when the file shows up. For now, making the file "reappear" is a purely manual, non-ardour task. |
