Mouse click on item changes track selection

[_Stevie_]

I'm proposing a new option:



Reason:

the current option: "Mouse click/edit in track view changes track selection" does work partly, but it will also change track selection in empty areas of the arrange. This has all kinds of undesired side effects like:

Losing the rec-arm of the currently selected track, when only locating the edit cursor in an empty area.

Having an option to only change track selection on item click would prevent this.

[daniellumertz]

Originally Posted by _Stevie_

I'm proposing a new option:



Reason:

the current option: "Mouse click/edit in track view changes track selection" does work partly, but it will also change track selection in empty areas of the arrange. This has all kinds of undesired side effects like:

Losing the rec-arm of the currently selected track, when only locating the edit cursor in an empty area.

Having an option to only change track selection on item click would prevent this.

+1here

[Skorobagatko]

+1 great suggestion

[daeavelwyn]

+1 while working on complex project (specialiy orchestral / midi) this option could avoid tons of time wasted in zooming in/out !

[Klangfarben]

+1 This would be great

[mucknog]

+1 YES

[heda]

just added this to TI

[Joe90]

YES PLEASE!

There are a number of scripts floating around for this, but none of them work 100% smoothly with all other reaper features/scripts.

I agree on mouse click on empty space not being an effective replacement for this, and for that exact same reason - accidently altering the track that's armed or being recorded onto with a rogue click is WAAAY too easy with that setting on. Every mouse movement is a white knuckle ride if you're in a session and recording a take!

I use a track selection following item selection script combined with modifier + mouse wheel assigned to adjust track volume for a very fast mixing workflow. I'm normally in the arrange page, and can normally get a much better overview of where everything is laid out from there, so I marquee select a chunk of items and their corresponding tracks are auto-selected, then I can quickly nudge track volume up and down with the mouse wheel + modifier. This is almost always much quicker and easier than clicking over to the TCP or mixer, especially on a huge, zoomed out project.

Side note - if multiple items are selected ACROSS tracks, all corresponding tracks should be selected (I assume this was your intention Stevie, just wanted to reiterate this point just in case).

One example of the complications of scripting this and why it should be native - a bug/side effect of the current script I use for this means that if I select a track, record a take and then hit 'undo', the item selection reverts to whatever was previously selected, and if that previous selection was on another track then the track selection also changes, unarming the track I'm trying to record onto (which is set to autoarm when selected). Technically the script is doing it's job, but it shouldn't do it in that specific situation. A native solution could effectively work around these issues and niggles It's too ground level a feature to be handled by a third party script in my opinion.

[sonictim]

I’m currently using the lokasenna “link track selection with item selection) deferred script, which is great, but I would definitely love for this to be built in to reaper as a preference/setting/option and not as an add on script. +1

[Thonex]

+1

I would add that API access to that Checkbox would be great so we can Key Command it and script it!!

[daeavelwyn]

Some news about this for people passing by

A script by Lokasenna do this : "Script: Lokasenna_Track selection follows item selection.lua"

You can find it in the reapack.

[Dragonetti]

+1 YES

[_Stevie_]

Bringing this up again

[olkash i psih]

I'm stupid)))

[vitalker]

Originally Posted by olkash i psih

but it's already working, right?

Yes, it is, but check the first message in the thread. It is not about items.

[olkash i psih]

Originally Posted by vitalker

Yes, it is, but check the first message in the thread. It is not about items.

Oh, I get it

[vitalker]

Originally Posted by olkash i psih

Oh, I get it

My first thought was the same, but then I read it.

[juan_r]

Maybe the new option could be named something like

Mouse click in track view changes track selection ONLY IF ON AN ITEM

and be a sub-option of the existing "Mouse click/edit in track view changes track selection"?

I'm all for it, too.

[_Stevie_]

Yep, that would be a great idea, splitting the option in 2 sections.

[mozart999uk]

+1 yes please.

My use case:

I have it set so that "track selection follows item selection".

I want to lasso two items on one track. There's no space left and right of the items. I click above (or below) the items and drag my selection to cover both items. Now the track above (or below) is selected and record armed.

I also use a custom action where "solo follows selected track". In the above scenario, I'm now soloing the wrong track!

[sockmonkey72]

Bumping, this would be a great refinement of the existing option.

[sockmonkey72]

Originally Posted by sockmonkey72

Bumping, this would be a great refinement of the existing option.

Let me qualify my bump, I would like a track selection follows item selection mode. So that clicking an item, marquee-selecting an item or script-selecting an item can all reliably be counted on to update the track selection.

Simply excluding the arrange view background still leads to inconsistencies in track selection.

[_Stevie_]

Marquee-ing it should definitely be an option, because when moving a bunch of items spread across multiple tracks, each of these tracks would be selected. A bad side effect would be the real-time performance going up like crazy. Just a consideration!

[_Stevie_]

Now, that I think about it a bit more, maybe these options should be incorporated into mouse modifiers?

- select item + select corresponding track
- marquee select + select corresponding track

[sockmonkey72]

Originally Posted by _Stevie_

Now, that I think about it a bit more, maybe these options should be incorporated into mouse modifiers?

- select item + select corresponding track
- marquee select + select corresponding track

This is a great suggestion.

If there's some way to ensure behavioral consistency in the way item selection is reflected by track selection, I'm good. Right now, the only consistent option is to turn off the default arrange-click behavior. Scripting this stuff isn't really satisfying, either, due to the polling involved.

[BirdBird]

+1
I currently use a script to sync item selections with track selections (which can cause some other issues), would be nice to have it supported natively.

[sockmonkey72]

And because I am pedantic and very annoying, here's why this should be native:

- scripted solutions depend on polling and defer(), which essentially ensures that selection of items is asynchronous to track selection, which also means that you can't assume anything about what tracks are selected when triggering actions or running scripts which adjust item selection. A native implementation of track-selection-follows-item-selection would presumably be synchronous and predictable.

- there's no way to do this via Mouse Modifiers, either, at least not completely. For instance, drag modifiers, like marquee-selection, can't be overridden or extended by actions.

- most native actions target "selected tracks" and have no option for "tracks of selected items", which forces users to either lose time selecting tracks during editing operations, or to roll their own scripts, which then suffer from the above problem, or require additional logic added for caching, modifying and restoring track selection.

- pedantic -- the current preference is incomplete: either you can never change track selection in response to editing operations in the arrange view; or you can sometimes change track selection based on clicks on or near items, but not in other editing situations. Consistency may be a hobgoblin of small minds, but it's not always wrong.

Maybe there are other reasons, these are the ones which I find most problematic.

I am not generally allergic to scripting and don't often argue for native implementations of scriptable stuff, but I am convinced that fundamental editing operations, particularly those which are already partially supported in the application prefs, deserve built-in implementations.

[_Stevie_]

I created a quick mockup to visualize the mouse modifier:

Item selection:



Marquee selection:

[Thonex]

Originally Posted by _Stevie_

I'm proposing a new option:



Reason:

the current option: "Mouse click/edit in track view changes track selection" does work partly, but it will also change track selection in empty areas of the arrange. This has all kinds of undesired side effects like:

Losing the rec-arm of the currently selected track, when only locating the edit cursor in an empty area.

Having an option to only change track selection on item click would prevent this.

+1

This would be fantastic. And if the Devs could make a Reascript function for this.

Hopefully, this functionality would also work with Shift-Clicking multiple items on different tracks to select the associated tracks.

Great feature request.

Cheers,

Andrew K

[mozart999uk]

Nice suggestions all :-)

[R.Cato]

Just found this request. Great ideas. Hope they add these suggestions.