Feature Requests

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Revision as of 22:52, 5 August 2007 by Radioman (talk | contribs) (→‎Interface Tweaks: - add suggestion for envelope tool)
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Click here to add a new request. Before doing this, please:

  1. Check down the page to see if your idea has not already been suggested.
  2. Check our Completed Features page to see if your idea hasn't already been implemented.
  3. If you have a raft of related changes for a particular use of Audacity, e.g. wildlife recording or Theatre, check the Use Cases page.
  4. If the feature uses a proprietary format, check whether it is one of the Features We Can't Implement because of restrictions placed on us by other copyright holders. Examples include 'Rewire' support, ASIO and WMA.
  5. Please try to keep feature requests as short as possible so that it's easy to quickly scan the whole list. If a long description of the feature is unavoidable, please add it at Longer Descriptions of Proposed Features for now.


If you would like to add your vote for an existing suggestion on this page, please use the "Edit" link at the top of the page or to the right of the section, and change the number of votes next to the feature. You may also re-sort the list. Please be honest and only increase the count by one, and please only vote for 6-8 features. However, once a feature has been completed (like VU meters, in Audacity 1.2.2), you can vote for another, too!


Please note: while we always consider the best and most often mentioned requests for inclusion in Audacity, we cannot undertake to implement any particular request made here.


Interested in sponsoring a feature? Please contact us for information if you want to contribute money in order to have your most desired feature implemented sooner.


Highest-rated, already in CVS head

These will move to 'already implemented' once released and documentation has been updated.

  • Horizontal line at 0 (DC=0) to more easily detect DC offset. (19 votes) Note: Implemented in CVS
  • More precise Volume leveling (both gain and input volume where card supports it (16 votes) Note: you can shift-click to drag the gain/pan sliders with more precision, and in 1.3.3 dragging the sliders will now do so in 1 unit increments
  • Loop file or marker in track (i.e. drum lines, bass loops, etc.) (11 votes) Note: The "Loop Play" command ("L" or shift-play) and the "Repeat" effect provide limited looping features.
  • VoiceActivated -Recording (VOR or VOX) - stops recording when you are not speaking but continues to record in the same file when you start speaking again (14 votes) Note: an experimental feature to pause recording when input falls below a user-defined level has been implemented in CVS
    • This should include a feature to keep paused or keep recording for a user-defined time once threshold reached (2 votes)
  • Preview
    • Cut or Selection: Plays 3 secs before and after the selected area but skips the selection itself (16 votes) Note: Already implemented in the Beta 1.3.3 version. Use the "C" hotkey, and customise the length of preview in the Audio I/O tab of Preferences
    • Selection Beginning-End: Listen to a few seconds of the beginning of selection; Listen to a few seconds of the end of selection (to test whether long selection is desired selection) (2 votes) Note: Already implemented in stable and Beta versions. Use the "B" hotkey and place mouse cursor near start or end of selection, and audio plays from start of selection to mouse cursor, or from mouse cursor to end of selection
  • A "paste special" function, my main desire would be the ability to paste a loop 2 or 9 or 'x' number of times, but might also include some other paste options (1 votes)
    • select the section, then use the "Repeat" effect ?


Highest-rated

Note: Anything with 10 or more votes can be moved here by cut-and-paste so that it will really grab the Audacity developers' attention!


  • Punch-in and punch-out recording (32 votes) *PLEASE!*
  • Panning envelope editing (31 votes)
  • Multi-channel output (e.g. mix down to Dolby 5.1, 7.1, 10.2, 64.4 etc, Playback w. ALSA and Export (maybe OGG multichannel ?)). (31 votes)
  • Synchronize playback / recording without manual time-shift tool (53 votes)
  • Ability to drop vertical marks that are 'glued' to the waveform on the main track (not on a label track). They should move when when track is moved, and also be adjustable and label-able. Should be possible to highlight for cutting, copying or other operations the area between two adjacent marks. This is an extremely useful feature available in Sound Forge and most other editing programs. (If this feature were installed, AMARC would recommend and distribute Audacity for the worldwide community radio editing norm. It would be wonderful to have it available by November 2006 when AMARC has its quadrennial conference! [see www.amarc.org} Add AMARC's 3000+ worldwide members to the votes here.) (18 Votes and rising)
  • Automation: Capacity to apply to a great numbers of files in a batch mode the following actions: to normalize, to make fade in (from the beginning) and fade out (from the end), determining the time of the fades in seconds (18 votes)
  • Ability to make selection between labels (like double clicking between markers in soundforge) (2 votes) Note: in 1.3.3 you can click in a label, drag a selection from that point and have it snap to any other label
  • Ability to select multiple non-adjacent labels (such as with control-click or shift-click (which is better for previously requested item)). Then pressing the play button would play all of the selected areas in the audio file, skipping the non-selected regions. This feature would be useful for comparing two regions of an audio file without delay between the playback of the two (or more) labeled regions.
  • Set selection based on multiple time-points as "clipped in" or "clipped out," and then have the ability to play the track with "clipped in" points only -- standard feature on professional audio editing systems. (3 votes)
  • Should be MTC/MMC slave and master
  • Import/Export Aud-X (mp3 5.1) files (1 votes)
  • Import/Export AAC/MP4 files using open source FAAC library. This would support AAC multichannel and AAC+ (low bitrate streaming-optimised variety of AAC) (26 votes)
  • Bpm Detection and beats / bars timecode and automatic beat matching/syncing with 2 or more songs (23 votes)
  • Allow real time adjustment RealTimeAdjustment (17 votes)
    • could allow effect intensity/LADSPA plugin parameters/panning to be varied in real-time?
    • include something similar to the envelope tool to adjust the effect parameters?
  • Fast-foward and Fast-reverse to the Next or Previous Silence, Edit or marked Point - see this forum suggestion (18 votes) Note that you can already tab between labels when the focus is in the Label Track, then click in the label to recall the point or selection area denoted by the label
  • Would be nice if a batch file of sorts could be created that allows effects with given params in set order - this implements other requested features too
    • And if the FFT filter data were saved in a nice format, such as CSV, we could work around the currently awkward dialogue interface.
  • Allow direct MIDI editing/playback and incorporate midi sequencer (18 votes)
    • It doesn't make a lot of sense to add support for MIDI files if Audacity can't also be used as a sequencer. Obviously this would take some time, but if sufficiently developed would make Audacity competitive even with ProTools and Sonar!
  • Import/Export AC3 files (12 votes)

Segmenting Tracks

  • Parsing (automatically starts recording a new track) based on configurable "silence" period usually found between program segments (merged two items here) (8 votes) Note: try this script to create labels at each silence, then export multiple.
  • TextTrack (4 votes) Note: Audacity already has Label Tracks.
  • Export Multiple
    • change radio buttons under "Name Files" to check box or drop-downs with. i.e. Label/Track name and Number consecutively, and Prefix (e.g. <album><track><title> would now be automated. Postfix label as well? (4 Votes)
    • Progress dialogue should say "exporting 1 of 5, 2 of 5.." not string of "exporting entire Project" dialogues (4 votes)
  • Define selection start and selection end via keyboard while listening (3 votes). Commands exist to mark the region without stopping: Try "[" and "]". Audacity also has 'stop and select' (shift-a), that allows you to stop and set the selection start at the point you were listening to. However, once you have the region defined, it seems that you can operate withing that region. See also this Forum suggestion.
  • When setting volume envelope points for a track, it would be very useful (and sharp), when moving a edit point, having, in the status bar, or in a tooltip, the possibility of showing, while the point is dragged:
    • gain amount
    • position in the timeline
    • it's also very useful the possibility of having a tooltip appearing when the mouse is over a volume envelope point, telling the gain amount, and maybe also the position in the timeline (2 vote)
  • Adjust Clip Boundaries - Recovering original audio from adjoining split/deleted clip. Done in other programs (Audition1.5, Cubase, Vegas) with a drag corner at the start and end of clip. (2 votes)
  • Improve time shifting. When using the time shift tool, a useful improvement would be for the cursor within the track being moved to move with the track. Currently is stays at the same time setting. Additionally, if this cursor extended over other visible tracks, it would make it much easier to line up one track with the others. (1 vote)
  • Need display of Snap to { on | Off } setting (probably at bottom of screen) (1 vote) Note: already exists in stable version and has been fixed in Beta code.
  • Expand selection command: After recording from an LP or a cassette or a live session, a single track will contain multiple songs, which the user has to separate. Let the user place his cursor on a track, and then use a "Expand selection" command. Audacity should expand the selection on both sides (towards left and right) till it finds silence (or the beginning/end of the track) (2 votes) Also see [[1]] for similar ideas.)
  • Cue sheets: ability to import/export cue sheets for CD burning (and/or text file compatible with shntool) to and from labels (4 votes) NOTE: There is a Java-based tool that converts Audacity's exported text files containing label information to cue information here.

Frequency Analysis Capabilities

This section is now at Suggested Frequency Analysis Capabilities.

Automation

  • Batch process a folder of audio files as follows for making samples for the web: open file, select portion of file between 0:30 and 1:00, trim away the rest of the file, add fade in and fade out, save as 128kbps mp3. I have to do literally thousands of these a month by hand. (6 votes)
    • look at a comand line program like SOX (http://sox.sourceforge.net/) - works best for jobs that are strictly repetitive, with no user input.
  • Ability to use the bass boost in batch encode (1 votes)
  • Convert between file formats / bit depths / sample rates in the same way (9 votes)
  • How about simply allowing any effects to be used in batch mode, with the specified parameters, like a macro script? (4 votes) (Couldn't we just add all other batch mode request votes to this?)
  • Scriptability
    • LibAudacity - library allowing integration with other C code. not a pre-requisite for all of the following (6 votes)
    • Control Audacity from Python (6 votes)
    • Control Audacity from Visual Basic (1 votes)
    • Control Audacity from TCL/TK (0 votes)
    • Control Audacity from AppleScript (5 votes)
    • Control Audacity from command line (20 votes)
    • Control Audacity from tcp or unix socket (could enable all of the above easily)
    • Nyquist debugger within Audacity (0 votes)
    • Ability to save currently applied filters (those appeared in Undo/Redo) as an editable (probably Nyquist) script. (1 votes)
    • User defined composite operations (scripts) bound to a button (2 votes)
  • PlugIn Support (1 votes) - allow plugins to replace any/all of audacity and expose all of audacity to plugins for manipulation. Will allow plugin packages for specialized applications (video-editing, CD ripping, CDDA support, for example)
  • RSS Support (mainly to podcasters) in 'Podcast Projects', integrated with FTP, then the RSS is automatic created and the Podcast is uploaded to Server (0 votes)

Dcop support

It would be great if Audacity could support dcop, which is "a light-weight interprocess and software componentry communication system. The main point of this system is to allow applications to interoperate, and to share complex tasks. Essentially, DCOP is a ‘remote control’ system, which allows an application or a script to enlist the help of other applications."

Ideally, using dcop all of Audacity's functions could be controlled from the command line or through a shell script. Here's a sample shell script to illustrate something that should be easy to do if all of Audacity's functions were available through dcop: 

 for file in *.mp3
 do
   dcop audacity import foo.mp3
   dcop audacity select 00:00:00 00:00:05
   dcop audacity cut
   dcop audacity export foo.mp3
   dcop audacity close
 done

That script would delete the first five seconds of every mp3 file in the current directory.

Of course, a full-featured dcop interface could accomplish something much more complicated, things that would be difficult or impossible to do using chains, and for which plugins would not really be appropriate (such as operations on multiple files, and incorporating data not already in audacity). A dcop interface would also make integrating audacity with other applications (such as Amarok, for example) very easy. Also consider D-Bus, the successor to dcop.

  • Note: Audacity scripting support may evolve into D-Bus in time. See the developer mailing list for details.

Effects

  • A de-clipper for repairing overdriven sound. (3 votes) Note : try Clipfix
  • Preview effects for whole duration of a selection, with option to loop the preview(2 votes) Note: Ability to choose preview length has been added to the Beta
  • Allow effects to be applied in realtime (4 votes)
  • Include a grid in the EQ display (1 vote)
  • Add effects for post-processing records (like GramoFile ) (7 votes)
  • Noise gate (not noise removal, just a simple binary gate) (6 votes)
  • Truncate silence. Implemented in 1.3.x for mono tracks but needs to work in stereo (8 votes)
  • Generate silence does not change zoom level (3 votes)
  • Generate tone does not change zoom level (4 votes)
  • Generate tone exactly covers selection (ie beep out) (3 votes)
  • Generate tone provides a drop down list of notes to set the frequency - i.e. middle C (264Hz), etc. (3 votes)
  • Single menu command for Extract vocals/instrumental from stereo sources (5 votes) Note: This is very hit and miss - on many recordings simple techniques don't work well or at all. A Nyquist plugin can be used for automatic centre extraction and other plugins can be tried. See Vocal Removal
  • Allow MIDI files to control VST Instruments (1 vote)
  • Dolby B and Dolby C input and output filters (for converting to/from tape recordings in Dolby) (1 votes)

Will need quite a lot of trial and error by ear, as the Dolby process is recording level dependent. Needs expander and treble cut.
I agree. It would be tricky to get it right without straight-up copying the actual process. This would be a licensing no-no. Trust me, I work at Dolby.
There is a Winamp plugin which simulates Dolby decoding here.

I wonder about a tool to easy removing of noise could be useful in the program. Like the rubber tool in f.ex. photoshop. The rubber tool should flatten the noise when you touch the noise. It would then be possible to remove noise with less zooming. And maybe it could be useful to have the possibility to set the pencil to (f.ex. with SHIFT ) only go complete horizontally.

  • Effects should have recallable presets and/or should remember their last settings after exiting Audacity. (3 votes) Currently only Equalization in the Beta 1.3.3 has this ability
  • Gradually increasing/decreasing tempo changes (without pitch) to facilitate DJ-style mixing
  • Allow the effects drop-down menu capable of sub-folders or categorisation (the slide-over menu hierarchy following the directory structure of the Plug-Ins folder inside the Audacity install folder), so that the user can organize his plug-ins however he wishes. This could include a Favourites folder which would be at the top for frequently used plugins. How about making the "Favorites" area be auto-generating (not something the user needs to create in the file structure) by having Audacity keep track of the top-10 (10 most used) effects, and placing the most-used effect at the top?? (8 votes)
  • Ability to bind functions (effects, plugins, etc) to buttons and/or keystrokes. E.g. one keystroke to amplifiy +3db, another keystroke -3db, another to compress (2 votes)
  • Apply Change Speed effect to labels as well as audio, otherwise, labels become out of step.
  • Surprised no one requests an exciter to enhance album or tape recordings. It is actually an easy effect and only needs a high pass and distortion. This is widespread use in recording studios and radio stations.
  • Something like a combination of Voltage-Controlled Oscillator and the "Sample and Hold" modules of the old ARP 2600 Synthesizer [analog], where you could sample another waveform (in another track) at regular time intevals, and the instaneous level of the sample determines the frequency of a tone generated for the same interval of time. In the real-world Arp 2600, you could patch the output of a VCO (or other audio source) into the input of the S&H module, then patch the S&H output into the control voltage input jack of another VCO. In the Audacity version, the user makes a selection in the track to be sampled (analogous to the first VCO) , and then (in a dialog box) selects the time interval between samples, the minimum and maximum frequency to be generated. The duration of the resulting sequence of tones to be generated in a new track would be the same as the duration of the original selection. Optional - select sine, sawtooth, square, or triangle waveforms for the generated tone. Another option would be to be able to sub-divide the length of the selection into X number of sample intervals, as opposed to specifying the duration of the interval. Typical results would be a sequence of discrete pseudo-random (frequency) tones at regular intervals, like a retro movie sound effect for a computer that's busy thinking. Another example: Sampling a triangle waveform whose period is much longer than the sample interval would result in a series of ascending and descending stepped tones.
  • Effects - normalise - percentages: Would it be possible to have a percentage normalisation option (as an alternative to decibels)? Many people have problems with decibels.
  • Effects - normalize - use David Robinson's Replay Gain algorithm: The current normalize method in 1.3.2 uses peak value as indicator of loudness, which is far from what human ears perceive. The algorithm outlined by David Robinson in Replay Gain seems to approach human perception better than simply taking the peak value. In the Replay Gain algorithm, if the "equal loudnes filter" is hard to implement, we can start with "RMS Energy Calculation" and "Statistical Processing" first.
  • Gverb Negative roomsize: In Gverb I'd swear we used to be able to apply negative roomsize which reduced reverb which improved back-of-the-room recordings. Can this be reinstated?
  • Make a specific de-essing plug-in available (3 votes)

Improved Resource Control

  • Allow recording from multiple channel sound devices at once - a lot of multi-channel cards look like this to the application, rather than one multi-channel device. A good behavior could be: (7 votes)
    • there must me the possibility of selecting, for any track, a recording source, from the ones available for a certain sound card (also with the possibility of using multiple sound cards)
    • for mono tracks a mono IN form the sound card must be choosen; for stereo tracks, two mono INs from the soundcard must be choosen (but they can also be the same)
    • for each track the INs can be the same or different, and there must be a key for selecting whether the track is selected for recording or not
    • a versatile possibility would be to be able to choose the default recording source from Audacity just the way it is done now, and this is selected by default for each track, but with the possibility, for each track, of selecting a different recording source, the way I just described
    • this would also allow the possibility of easily setting the sampling rate, depth and number of channels for a track, before recording, and not simply based on master Audacity preferences and project settings, with maximum versatility
  • IdlePriority
  • Disk use limit for recording (6 votes)
  • Search and recognize existing hardware capabilities. Specifically, note limits on quality achievable due to RAM configuration, DAC bit counts, soundboard specifics such as db gain at recording levels (41, 44, 96), and other software installed on the machine (iTunes, other popular players / organizers). Then customize recommendations by what is doable on that machine, but still allow anyone to get extreme if they wish. (0 votes)
  • Loop record option, commit last 2 hours of recording, at any moment. (2 votes)
  • Undo buffer management:
    • Compress undo buffers (2 votes)
    • (You can already clear the Undo buffers by opening the Undo History dialog box, and compressing will take lots of CPU and have little space gain unless you use a lossy compressor, which kind of defeats the point of undo...)
    • Save undo history into the project file(s) - useful for picking up on a project at a later time (2 vote).
    • Save undo history as a .txt file - it would be very useful for documenting what steps had been done.
    • Per-track undo history and stack. So you don't have to undo a bunch of changes you DO want on some tracks to get rid of something you did a while ago to another track. Also, the history would be viewable per track so you can remember what effects and such each track has had applied (so you don't mess up the effects chain order or over-do anything).
  • Better space management. (2 votes) True, selecting a smaller sampling rate could take up less space, but there's no reason why a comparably small amount of data (a couple 4-megabyte mp3s with very minor edits) should take up as much space as it does (~500 megabytes). The concept of the _data folder is confusing, and the small file size of the .aud itself is misleading. If a user accidentally moves the _data folder or modifies it, the program refuses to accept it, and the user must either figure out what they have done wrong and attempt to repair it (not very newbie friendly), or start from scratch. Perhaps an incremental version check to the audio files (a la Volume Shadow Copy) would be beneficial, because as of now, it seems to save anything it can and wants.

Imports and Exports

Note: There are some file formats and effect interfaces we can't support for commercial reasons. Please check our Features We Can't Implement page before adding features to the list below.


  • Import/Export QuickTime files on Windows/Mac (6 votes) Note: Support for importing QuickTime based formats has been reintroduced in 1.3.3 for users on OS X
  • Import/Export OMF multi-track to/from ProTools /Cakewalk, etc. (3 votes)
  • Import/Export MPC files (Windows) (2 votes)
  • Import/Export DSS (3 votes)
  • Import (extract) and/or Export (burn) CD audio tracks (12 votes) There is experimental code for CD Import/Export in progress. Help welcome.
  • Facilitate importation of MP3 or other sound formats from video files or program/transport streams (e.g. by demuxing the audio) (3 votes)
  • Support for Speex codec (similar to Ogg Vorbis but optimized for voice) (8 votes)
  • Import/Export AMR (Adaptive Multi-Rate) found e.g. on Nokia/SonyEricsson Mobile Phones' Voice Memo or Playing features (supported in ffmpeg) (8 votes)
  • Export over a currently open .wav file (so Audacity can edit samples for a host sequencer without the user finding the new file) (1 vote)
  • Import meter/key meta-events from MIDI-file (to represent time in measure/beat) & markers. (0 votes)
  • Export multiple using labels to split tracks should filter out disallowed characters from filenames. e.g. a label of '01 - When?' should strip off the ? when creating the file name (1 vote)
  • Option to export a meta-data file that records all changes made (5 votes)
  • support import and export of AVI files including the video (4 votes)

what would you do with the video? - also, AVI is a wrapper, so would need dozens of codecs to cope with range of AVI file compressions. Could easily double the size of audacity just to open and play video files (look at Mplayer, Xine etc)
i guess the idea is, at least thats what i would need it for, to edit the "soundtrack" of a video while keeping the image reference. there is no need for audacity to actually modify the video itself, only play along the video to the audiotrack of the avi / mov whatever. audacity wouldnt need to handle any video codec issues, the user has to take care of that himself. I guess it would even be helpful if you had to export the video to one specific codec & format, i.e. .mov with "mjpeg A" codec. its only to keep the video reference for the sound editing, the process of combining the exported audio track with the full resolution video is usually done (for example with protools) in the video editing software.

  • Define both ID3v1 and ID3v2 tags simultaneously (rather than just either-or) (3 votes)
  • Allow leaving genre field blank (2 votes)
  • Allow custom genre in genre field for ID3v2 (5 votes)
  • Ability to right click on multiple audio files in Explorer and have them open a project and then add to that project
  • When doing an export multiple to break a long track by labels, it would be useful for each WAV file to be an exact number of CDDA frames (similar to using the snap to option). Samples could be carried over (or borrowed) from following section as required. This would be useful when buring CDs to avoid microgaps. The FLAC encode actually has an option to do this. (2 votes)
  • Ability to extract and import Vorbis portion of Ogg files encoded with non-audio tracks, such as Theora. Currently gives an error "unknown format", straightforward modifications should do the trick. (1 vote)
  • When exporting multiple, have progress dialogue explicitly state which of the files is currently being processed (3 votes)
  • MIDI Sequencer (as requested before) to control Reason
  • Export Text Labels as XML: For using Audacity to analyze interviews or to generate Audio-Picture-Slideshows it should be possible to export all Text-Labels (with names) as XML. Nodes: "trackname" with Nodes "start, end, label".
  • Importing a project into another project: Importing an Audacity project into another one could highly facilitate the development of big projects, because one can maintain the different parts separated
  • ID tags for each imported file: Multiple imported files should retain their own ID tags rather than take the tags of the first imported file (2 votes)
  • Import/Export OFR files: It would be nice to be able to import and export OptimFROG files (.ofr), a lossless audio format that's smaller than FLAC.
  • For command line exports, let the user make presets in a .ini or .xml file rather than retype over for different formats. (1 vote)
  • Import/Export Project File Format to Advanced Authoring Format (AAF): Or even use AFF instead of .aup. Probably it would be a great idea to keep audacity projects compatible to other audio (and video) editing softwares. I am neither a lawyer nor a programmer so I cannot say if AAF the best possible standarized file format, from a user point of view it sounds nice as a lot of other companies are supporting it already. [AAF on Wikipedia]
  • Allow direct import of MIDI files into Projects as sampled audio waveforms, which are then editable and exportable as WAV, MP3 etc. (2 votes)

---

Interface Tweaks

Suggestions for small changes to the program interface. If it would take more than a day to implement and test it does not belong in this section! In many cases these are differences in user preferences, and would be best provided as an option.

Also, see Use Cases for a number of ideas for hot-keys that would be used during playback or recording.

  • Exported tracks should respect the mute button and not be exported. The only way to stop a track being exported is to delete it before doing an export. (5 votes)The workround is to select the tracks you want to export, then use File > Export Selection As.. You select an individual track by clicking above its mute/solo buttons. You can select multiple tracks out of a number on screen by SHIFT-selecting them i.e. select the first track you want to export, then hold down SHIFT while similarly clicking on the other tracks. Discuss this in the forum.
  • Add option for playback cursor to resume at stop point, not start point (4 votes) You can already do this by adding a keyboard shortcut to 'stop and select'. However, it would be nice to be able to add a keyboard shortcut for 'play/stop and select', in the same way as space is assigned to 'play/stop'. Discuss this in the forum.
  • Envelope Tool improvement (1 vote): separate mouse clicks for adding control points and adjusting envelope - change envelope without having to be near a control point. At the moment, clicking adds a control point and drags. If you are far from a control point and want to tweak the envelope, but don't want to add a new control point, you need to go back to the control point. Suggestion: alt-click adds control point (no change to envelope). Click and drag adjusts the current envelope segment (i.e. adjusts the control point at the start of the envelope segment). (Mouse clicks assignable in preferences/mouse)
  • Allow for a track to be immediately deleted with the upper-left X-button while it is playing: the action of clicking 'stop' is superfluous in that case. (1 vote)
  • Add a Select Current View button to Edit Toolbar (1 vote)
  • Add a Select All button to Edit Toolbar (1 vote)
  • Have a separate button for loop play (1 vote) currently you press shift and then click play, which may not be discovered (but when the mouse hovers over the Play button, the status bar displays the words, "Play (Shift for loop-play)"
  • Mixer toolbar needs L....R balance control (2 votes)
  • Ability to default (or remember) the zoom. Currently defaults to 10 seconds or so depending on screen width, where I would like it to default to 3 minutes.
  • Persistent Track Height: When I open up tracks in the new beta program they are very small, is it possible so that I can resize them to always open approx. the same size as 1.2.6? cheers Les.
  • More colorful: I think It needs to be more colorful. All of the grayness is boring and depressing. (theming of audacity is on the way post 1.4.0).
  • Spacebar and other keyboard controls should always work without the need to click on the track.
  • Remember import data for raw: When importing raw data, the sample rate is not remembered from last time. If I change from 44100 to 8000 I want that to be default next time I import something.
  • Keyboard Modifiers in User Interface: I was wondering why audacity does not make use of keyboard modifiers in the UI? It could speed up the working process significantly... for example soundforge has the shift modifier so you could move a selection without changing the duration. For me, the more the better, once you know the modifier functions its much more comfortable than changing tools before doing something.
  • Import preferences from HKLM: It would be very helpful in deployment situations if you could easily specify program defaults. Specifically on windows, if the 'Audacity' HKCU key doesn't exist, 'Audacity' in HKLM could be checked for and copied across to HKCU if it exists.
  • Add a preference choice to permanently turn off the "Save project?" question when closing the program. Instead, just quietly save no matter what. How does Audacity know what filename/folder to save to if you record into an empty Project?
  • Add much more Context Menu (right-click or CTRL-click) functionality (2 votes)

Recording Enhancements

  • Option to Record to an Existing Track Rather than to a New One: It would be useful to have the OPTION to record to an existing track at the current cursor position rather than always have to record to a new track and then copy/paste from there back to an existing one. (11 votes) Note: Beta 1.3.3 now allows you to hold SHIFT while pressing Record to append recording the end of a selected track or tracks
  • Have the preference for monitoring be on by default (11 votes)We initially didn't do this because of concerns about performance on lower powered machines. We've since had feedback on this that is works fine and that not having monitoring 'on' is causing a bigger problem - especially with new users. This is an easy change and will be fixed in version 1.4
  • Stop Recording Before Disk Filled: Instead of having to perform crash recovery because of recording to a full hard disk, why not simply stop recording just before the disk is full? (1 vote)
  • Suggestions for Beta Timer Record: Accessible from File Menu so when you hit record button dialogue would come up that would give you choices. (1 vote)
  • Ability to set Timer Record to automatically use stored settings to start recording on a daily basis (1 vote)
  • Simple voice recorder build: wondering if it might be possible to create a simple, stripped down version of audacity that would simply record and spit out to mp3. I'd like to use audacity to record meetings and brownbags etc at my company, but right now it's a little too complex to put in peoples' hands. -:)Bnardone 13:32, 18 April 2007 (PDT) Perhaps someone should resurrect Audacity Remote Control [2]
  • Similer to above. A plug-in or additional toolbar that operates as a standalone light recording interface / remote control. Audacity could be minimised in the background and this interface could be "always-on-top" enabling Start, Stop, Pause, with monitoring and control of input levels like the current input on the toolbar. (1 Vote)
  • Recording should be done in a way where crash recovery is MUCH better (make it an option if you have to). Basically if someone pulls the plug on the computer while recording, everything should be still there (including the necessary metadata) except perhaps the last block (subject to filesystem limitations). Currently you risk losing stuff or have to recreate stuff by patching the raw files together - this is not reasonable. In contrast with most other recorders including tape, you have everything up till that point. Why not just write the necessary metadata to disk? Link 23:46, 20 July 2007 (PDT)Recording recovery has recently been corrected in CVS head.

Clipping

  • Color code levels for clipping: On the waveform display have a colored background that goes yellow .7 then red .9, the levels where clipping will occur.
  • Better peak / clip indications (2 votes): Something I'd like to see added to Audacity would be an indicator for each track showing the peak meter reading for the track. This would be especially helpful in live recording scenarios, so we can see if we clipped. Right now, I have to watch the meters in real time, and even the sliding peak indicator only holds it's position for a couple of seconds. I note that Cakewalk Sonar has this on each channel (with a reset button) and it's very helpful. Possible implemtation options: a max level (i.e "-3.5db") per track at the far left track info box, which could be turned red if it ever went to "0.0".
    • It would be really good to have some basic tool to do a final check that nothing is distorted. If this is too tricky to do on-the-fly, then perhaps a plug-in under "Analyse" menu item, called 'detect peaks', that can be run on the project as a whole or on tracks, and would return the maximum peak detected, and warn if that is 0dB. It would be easy enough to do this in nyquist (see silence detection above), except that it seems to be the case that audacity only passes a single track to nyquist processing, and there is no option for passing the stereo mix to a nyquist plugin. Discuss in forum.

Unclassified

Some of these may be classifiable into the categories above...


  • Count number of clipped samples: See SampleClipCount
  • Logarithmic Y axis scale: in the spectral track view would be cool, so played notes are easiliy transcribable to music notes (1 vote)
  • Note recognition with wav-to-Midi capabilities: (1 vote)
  • A beep after certain types of operation have completed; the operations would be things like file import/export which can take a long time (which means that the user may wish to do another task while waiting for it to compete, but would like to return to audacity the instant that the operation has completed); an additional option would be to have a popup (1 vote)
  • Scrubbing: While playing back audio, I'd like to be able to drag and drop the time position indicator (cursor) left and right to skip to various places in the project. When I release the mouse button, playback should resume at that position. This is not an unusual feature - it is merely how every single one of dozens other audio players work. Good for controlling the end of (long) selections. So you don't have to start from the beginning and hear it all for the n-th time. (4 votes) Note: There is a hotkey B for play to selection. See here for tips on changing the playback position.
  • Non-linear Fade In and Fade Out: Perhaps include the ability to change the rate of the fade in and fade out.
  • Automatically join tracks end to end: New option needed under the Project > Align Tracks menu that would align the selected tracks end to end. (3 votes)
  • Tap (in general): How about tap delay, and tap bpm input (1 vote); I already voted for bpm time code, but I think this deserves it's own section.
  • Create labels automatically at pre-defined intervals: Create labels automatically at pre-defined intervals on the timeline e.g. every 5 minutes. This would be of great help when you need to split a long continous single track from a speech.(4 votes) Note: There is a Nyquist plugin here which will do this.
  • Reversibly silent selection: Add the ability to silence a selection and later un-silent it (not just with undo, since we might want to do some other things before undo-ing the silence). Perhaps can be done similar to cut-lines.
  • `Peak hold` on limiter and compressors: A `peak hold` line on the compressors and limiter so that you can see what the maximum amount of compression/limiting was since starting. This can help in finding the right settings without having to watch stuff very very closely.
  • Indicators when audacity is busy: When I do a control-f (zoom to fit in window) in audacity on a 2 hour recording it takes a while before the waveform is displayed. Some busy indicator, maybe even progress bar might help. Same for moving around in a file, which can take time. (even on striped disks) This also affects re-drawing of the waveform after applying pretty much any Effect. (2 votes)
  • Statistics: Ability to gather statistics (Margin to dBFS, RMS volume, etc, see SF, WAvelab, etc) over an abirtrary length of audio, even the whole file.
  • DSD editing capabilities.: Korg MR-1 and MR-1000 are coming, making DSD more affordable, usable, etc. DSD editing software is rare and/or expensive. Dunno how well it blends with the current architecture for PCM. (bad?)
  • DirectX: I have an investment in some DX effects. I use audacity more than soundforge (easier to use and quicker) It would be nice to have DX support! (Pasted from orphaned page with this request, possibly superfluous. Suf 02:33, 7 July 2007 (PDT))

Requests for changes to Website

  • Add a link to this Wiki to the main (http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ ?) site's motif.
  • Add some prominent, or add some more prominent if it's already somewhere on this wiki, linkage back to the main place andor wherever a newbie can quickly find themselves installing Audacity on their computer.
  • Facilitate funding of features. Tip cup towards features? An "i'd give x dollars towards someone working on XYZ bit" kinda thing?

(1 vote)

Longer Descriptions of Proposed Features

(Edit Hint: Move some of these to new pages and condense??)

Secondary horizontal scrollbar for extents of selection

One very useful addition would be a secondary horizontal scroll bar (just above the existing standard horizontal scrollbar) that scrolls only the extents of selection.

This would come in handy when you've highlighted, say, one bar of a song, then want to zoom in to the sample level. You want to scroll back and forth in your selection, but the standard project-wide horizontal scrollbar isn't granular enough and you whiz way out of your selection. (1 vote)

Multi Channel Soundcard support - Posibillity to select Track input channel.

Also it does not seem to be possible on Windows at the moment, it would be really nice to have this function on Mac Os X and Linux, if possible. At the moment, if I like to make a stereo recording with my soundcards Microphone inputs, I have to create a 10 channel Project, to get to the input channels. If I like to use the digital Input its impossible, because of the restriction to 16 input channels. My digital Inputs are 21 to 28 ... so it would be important to increase at least the number of supported inputs.

Similarly, it would be very useful to allow a nonconsecutive set of input channels to be selected to deal with devices that send special outputs on the higher numbered channels. For example, Alesis's MultiMix-8 returns its mixed outputs, which is the only outlet for its on-board effects, on channels 9 and 10. A common setup for me is to use channels 1-3 for instruments and mics, and mix in some effects from the Alesis unit; I'd like to have Audacity record channels 1,2,3,9,10 instead of 1 thru 10.

Option to import .wav without resampling - changing .wav headers.

I have a problem with some .wav Files that I recorded, with an Hardiskrecorder, that had external sync to 48 kHz but due to an error in the settings after a short poweroff wrote 44.1 kHz in the .wav headers. This wavs now play at the wrong speed / pitch. If I import them to Audacity at 48kHz they are resampled, which is wrong, too. I´d like to just play them on 48k without other changes...

Clean up temp files when closing files during batch processing

In Audacity 1.3.2 beta, if you apply a chain to a group of files (with File, Apply Chain, Apply to Files), it will import each file, write uncompressed temp files during open and edits, export the file to complete the chain, and then proceed to import the next file. This process leaves on disk all the temp files created for all the files in the batch, which can cause the system to completely run out of disk space rather quickly. Instead, Audacity should clear out the temp file when closing each file. (4 votes)

Render MIDI as Audio based on 'free' samples.

One of suggested feature is as follows although presumably complex to implement.

There are MIDI sequencers, however what I felt was missing was the ability to render a MIDI file using samples from suitably 'free' sources such that the eventual full file was also 'free'.

I would therefore like to request that the Audacity team look into whether some kind of 'tracker' code could be incorporated into newer versions of Audacity. This would allow a user to effectively convert a MIDI or other forms of tracker file (i.e. Protracker) into RAW audio.

My reason for this request is so that old PD Music can be scored and performed without the need for actual musicians, and to allow conversion of sound-like files without having to payout for commercial tools.

ShakespeareFan00 10:15, 30 January 2007 (PST)

Playback at different speed

The beta (1.3.2) allows for playback at different speeds, but the slider bar is difficult to control accurately, it would be good if the speed ratio was also displayed in a textbox, that allows entry of a specific desired number.

Also, it would be nice to be able to record while playing back at the different speed. I realise this could be difficult, but often singers like to record vocals at a lower speed than the final playback, it adds an "edge" to their voice.RoscoHead 20:04, 17 February 2007 (PST)

I would also like to see a playback speed option included in the next release. I know there is one in the beta but I feel that as well as allowing the user to input a specific number, you can also have some pre-set speeds such as 50% slower or 50% faster etc. If you are looking for an example the music playing software JetAudio Basic COWON America Website are who manufacturer the program. This program has a playback speed changing feature with pre-set speeds such as 10% faster which can be applied while playback is occurring. 22.47, 10 May 2007 (GMT+10) - Nickdella

Collapse display of tracks into folders or sets

There can be many more tracks in a project than can be displayed easily on one screen. The Shift-Ctrl-F (auto-fit all tracks) feature in Audacity 1.2.6 does a good job of making all the tracks visible, but then the tracks have to be of very shallow height to be fitted on screen - and mute buttons etc. become hidden. Now that same difficulty can occur in Adobe Photoshop (a graphics image editor) if an image has many "layers". An elegant solution to this problem has been implemented in recent versions of Photoshop in the "layers palette". The same idea would work very well in Audacity. This is how it would work, translated into Audacity language: 1) A menu option "Create new TRACK GROUP" creates something that looks like a new track - it has a name, delete, balance, volume, mute and solo buttons - but it is not an audio track - it is a track "set" or "folder" or "group" or "collection". It also has an expand/collapse button on the left. I will call this thing a "group" for now. 2) Let's name this group "Rythm", for example. 3) If any audio tracks are dragged onto the "Rythm" group they are displayed under that group. 4) But if the "collapse" button of the "Rythm" group is clicked then the single "group" track is displayed as one horizontal strip but all the audio tracks inside it are hidden from view. 5) Balance, volume, mute and solo buttons on the Rythm group strip control the playback of all the audio tracks inside that group (though each audio track still has its own specific settings). 6) The Rythm group, and other groups, can be manipulated in their collapsed state by dragging up and down, collapsing, expanding, muting, adjusting volume, etc. 8) Individual audio tracks can be dragged from group to group, or dragged out of a group completely. 7) The visual appearance of the waveform area of a "group" strip could be just blank, or it could show for instance a simple normalised sum of all the audio tracks inside - that would aid usability. 8) Most of the audio editing functions would NOT be implemented for working on a "group" - that would still be done on the individual audio tracks visible in an expanded group. Here is an example of what a user might create in a working project using this idea: Groups named "Rythm", "Vocals", "Backing", "Count-in", "Roughwork", "Soundeffects", and "ScratchPad". Each group might contain about five separate audio tracks. That would be about thirty-five audio tracks in the project. Most of the groups would be displayed in the collapsed state with just one group expanded. All the tracks in the project would be available to view as desired without the confusion of all the tracks being in one unweildy long scrolling list.

Superimpose vertical grid-lines

A menu option to turn on/off a grid of thin vertical lines covering the whole waveform display area. This would help with the task of aligning sounds over multiple tracks. (With no grid this is quite difficult to do by eye, especially over four or five audio tracks.) The grid lines would not have to be adjustable in any way, just an on/off toggle. There would be a fixed number of vertical lines on the screen - about 30 (or user could chose a number). For super-accurate alignment the user would simply zoom in - expanding the audio tracks time scale - whilst the number and pixel distance spacing of the gridlines on screen would not change.

Non-destructive editing of compressed audio

Add capability for limited editing of lossily compressed audio in its native format, rather than decompressing into a full waveform and recompressing the processed audio. This would be ideal for quick editing of formats such as MP3, OGG, etc. especially at low bitrates without altering the quality of the track. Note: For non-destructive cut, paste and volume edits see MP3 Direct Cut (Windows) and Audion (OS X)

Headroom Indicators

On the waveform display, a horizontal line (actually two lines) at a user-specified number of dB below and above 0dBFS. This is for compliance with SMPTE and EBU standards calling for program material to have a specified amount of headroom before full-scale clipping. As previously suggested, the waveform trace could change color when it exceeds the specified headroom level. This would be in addition to the previously-suggested horizontal line at the DC level.

The VU meters should likewise have headroom indicators: a line drawn at n dB below 0dBFS. In addition, the color of the meter fill should change colors when the headroom level is exceeded. My suggestion for colors is green for levels below headroom, yellow for levels above headroom, and red when the level is 0dBFS (clipping).

The headroom level could be set using the existing Meter Preferences dialog.

Precision Selection Cursor Location

The ability to precisely enter the location of the selection cursor, current, start and end, ala SoundForge.

edit chain parameters

Please show us a list with some examples of possible parameters changes for use with "edit chain"

EX 1: (Reduce 4db at 2000 Hz with Q shelve 8 Db per Octave)

EX 2: De-esser fx ( threshold= -24 above 3800 Hz )

Thank you

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