add new track: take over "track-view visibility"

[enroe]

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background
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Every time we add a new track we have to correct ALL
"track-views" regarding the visibility:

If you have many many tracks, you don't wanna see
all these tracks in the mixer at once. Instead you would
split the mixer into different "small submixer". For instance,
you have a submixer for guitars, for vocals, for violins, for brass,
for groups and for sends etc.

In Reaper we can put these "small submixer" into practice by
using the visibility-parameter in the "track-views". Every "small
submixer" has its own "track-view" with its specific visibilty-
settings. This way we can confine the mixer to guitar-tracks,
vocal-tracks, violin-tracks etc.- and thus we have these "small
submixer".

So far so good. But what's the problem?

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problem
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The problem arises if we want to add a new track: Reaper
just adds the new track to EVERY "track-view". And so
this new track appears in every "small submixer". But this
new track should belong to one or maybe two "small submixers"
only.

We have to dig into every "track-view", remove the new track
from being visible in the "track-manager" and save the "track-
view-visibility" again. This is a tedious procedure (and I guess
there are already SWS-actions for it?).

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feature request
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In order to avoid the multiple "track-view" removals + edits after
adding any new track there could be a simple solution:

Every time when a track is added or duplicated, Reaper
does this:

1. Look which track was selected at last
2. Add the track-visibility of the new track to all the
track-views that were defined already.

This way the new added track will automatically join
the "submixer" of the last selected track.

[enroe]

Perhaps too much text? What does not percolate here is
the fact that you can build up

--> different submixer

by the use of "track-views".

However this feature-request is necessary in order to manage
submixers in a reaper-project - if you sometimes add a new
track.

[Steviebone]

I second, third and fourth this request! And I like the previous suggestion, add based on last track selected. It should get added to all sets that already include the last selected track.

[cairnan]

+1, I always make / keep all tracks visible in the first track view, then use 2-10 for specific views (e.g. drums only, strings only). When I add a new track (e.g. an acoustic guitar), I want it added to the first / main view...but not to the drum group, or the string / orchestra group.

As others have said, allow Reaper to keep track of the most recent selected track view, and only add the new track to that! Maybe make an option to toggle this in the settings.

[akademie]

I only quite don't understand why should it be based on last track selected? This does not give any reliable information, what kind of track (to which view) I want to add actually.
Maybe it's a workflow of some users, but not all.
But adding a modifier to insert track with option to display selection of views to select from could be useful on the other hand.

EDIT: There is also Tagging script, that allow to groups views according to the tags assigned or by name (so if you insert marimba, name the track e.g. Marimba1 {TUNED.PERC}) and it will automatically be visible in a view that tag is {TUNED.PERC} etc. I don't remember exactly the names of those scripts, beu tere are few, just browse ReaPack.

[enroe]

Originally Posted by akademie

I only quite don't understand why should it be based on last track selected? This does not give any reliable information, what kind of track (to which view) I want to add actually.

But this provides the right information!

Most of the time the last track you selected belongs to the "right"
track views. So the new track should also belong to exactly the same
track views.

Imagine you are working on the vocals, or the guitars, or the drums.
The new track you just added there should also belong to the
corresponding track views. This is actually the easiest and most
intuitive way!

Originally Posted by akademie

Maybe it's a workflow of some users, but not all.
But adding a modifier to insert track with option to display selection of views to select from could be useful on the other hand.

Mouse-modifiers are already overcrowded in Reaper.

What I can also think of is a pop-up-window, where you
can choose those track-views the new track should belong
to.

[akademie]

Originally Posted by enroe

...<snip>
Most of the time the last track you selected belongs to the "right"
track views. So the new track should also belong to exactly the same
track views.
<snip>...

This is where I strongly disagree.
Maybe it is one type of workflow, but then far from "most of the time ..." (paraphrased as "Most of the time when I am adding a track, it belongs exactly..." is truer representation).
I would say that this case perfectly matches your (and maybe few others) specific workflow where you are accustomed to do things this way as a routine maybe.

Newly added track can belong to any view group no matter what track was last selected in general.

Pop-up window on adding track(s) (optional command/action, something like "Insert track(s) with dialog...") is something that I would prefer and considered kind of optimal.

[cairnan]

Originally Posted by akademie

This is where I strongly disagree.
Maybe it is one type of workflow, but then far from "most of the time ..." (paraphrased as "Most of the time when I am adding a track, it belongs exactly..." is truer representation).
I would say that this case perfectly matches your (and maybe few others) specific workflow where you are accustomed to do things this way as a routine maybe.

Newly added track can belong to any view group no matter what track was last selected in general.

Pop-up window on adding track(s) (optional command/action, something like "Insert track(s) with dialog...") is something that I would prefer and considered kind of optimal.

Although the 'last track selected' is a workflow I think works well (you simply switch to the appropriate view and then add the track, I agree it's not suited to everyone's tastes or needs.

I think the main issue is related, but different: that adding a new track seems to (always) add it to every single track view, and there's no way to disable this behavior. This I think is problematic for most people's use cases, since most of us want to either add new track(s) to the last / currently active track view, or to some other track view, but not to ALL track views.

The way it is currently, if for example you had 9 track views, and added 10 vocal tracks to your 'vocal' track view, it would add them to all others as well, and you would have to remove them from the other track views manually. This is somewhat tedious, and many of us use Reaper specifically to remove that kind of tedium from our workflow. Regardless of individual workflows, at least having the option to disable this 'add track to all views' default would be a good start.

[enroe]

Originally Posted by cairnan

Regardless of individual workflows, at least having the option to disable this 'add track to all views' default would be a good start.

Yes, exactly!

At least as a start.

[akademie]

Originally Posted by enroe

Yes, exactly!

At least as a start.

yes, maybe, that shouldn't hurt general userbase, I think.

[cairnan]

For any newcomers to the thread, install SWS to remedy this. I've discovered the 'Snapshots' extension gives the functionality I / the OP / others desired. Just use Snapshots instead of the native 'track views' feature.

Open Snapshots, and put the Snapshots window in 'current visibility' mode, Then, enable 'Hide New Tracks on Vis Recall'. That will do it.

You will want to save the applicable snapshot each time you add new tracks, but the main thing is, new tracks will not get added to existing snapshots! So this will cover one of the main use cases we wanted. Justin and schwa probably didn't want to add something that's already implemented very well in SWS (which goes hand in hand with native Reaper / is practically 'native' to Reaper anyway).

Check out the other features of Snapshots as well - it has very powerful store and recall that go beyond just visibility!

[Miscreant]

Yeah, snapshots do work for this problem. I'm not nuts about this work around, since I like to keep my snapshots free for other purposes while mixing.

I just wish there were a better option for the track views themselves. I also wish there were an option to make track view settings global.

[cairnan]

Originally Posted by Miscreant

Yeah, snapshots do work for this problem. I'm not nuts about this work around, since I like to keep my snapshots free for other purposes while mixing.

I just wish there were a better option for the track views themselves. I also wish there were an option to make track view settings global.

Good point. A native / non-SWS visibility solution still seems necessary, for those who use the other snapshot features.

[enroe]

A small little bumb. Because, this feature is essential for normal
work in Reaper, where you can add tracks when you need them!