Sorting/Alphabetizing in Regions/Library views

[Teomi]

Hi there,

When viewing regions or audio files in Regions/Library view I am noticing that the sorting/alphabetizing gets wonky if there are numbers involved as part of the naming scheme.
For instance, if thee are audio filenames that end in ascending numbers then #100 will come after #10 and #11 after #109...this gets in the way when trying to import audio files recorded in other DAWs since the numbering method is pretty much the default way DAWs are naming recorded segments.

Any way to change this sorting behavior within SAW?


Thanks,
EItan

[cgrafx]

Hi there,

When viewing regions or audio files in Regions/Library view I am noticing that the sorting/alphabetizing gets wonky if there are numbers involved as part of the naming scheme.
For instance, if thee are audio filenames that end in ascending numbers then #100 will come after #10 and #11 after #109...this gets in the way when trying to import audio files recorded in other DAWs since the numbering method is pretty much the default way DAWs are naming recorded segments.

Any way to change this sorting behavior within SAW?


Thanks,
EItan

its not a SAW problem its an OS problem, as the file system doesn't have any idea what 10 and 100 are, just what ascii sequence they are.

If you wan't stuff to order numerically you have to pad the numbers to how ever many number of digits are required. 2, 3, 4, 5, etc

3-digit padding
001
002
120
100

4-digit padding
0001
0002
0003
0130
1500

[Teomi]

Ah! Thanks for clarifying, I didn't know that.

Eitan

[jmh]

If you wan't stuff to order numerically you have to pad the numbers to how ever many number of digits are required. 2, 3, 4, 5, etc

3-digit padding
001 ...

When I import, I usually list all the file names into a file and also a replacement name and do a command line to replace the name (Example (off top of head but might work - and only if filenames had no spaces) for linux (or mac) because it is what I know - but easily done in powershell).

d02_snare.wav snare001.wav
d03_snbot.wav snare_bottom002.wav
g01_rhythm.wav rhythmguitar.003.wav
...
d01_kick.wav ...
v01_lead.wav ...

# cat files.txt | sed 's/^\([^ ]\+\) ([^ ]\+\)$/cp \2 NEWPATH\1/' # (test it out, then pipe it into bash) | bash

This way when file are imported, they sort in the track order. You may have to get creative with your subscripts to get your sections in the order you like.

[Teomi]

Thanks for that!

BTW - in Windows the files are organized chronologically without an issue so I'm not sure why it isn't the same from library view but oh well..I guess I can do a batch renaming so that it will fall in order.

Eitan

[jmh]

Eitan,

A little gotcha that caused a lot of confusion is on my version of win10, the default open file view shows creation date rather than modification time.

My issue was with undos seeming not to save. I had a crash when opening a troublesome plugin. The .u?? was actually saving but the extension-name gets reused once you reach the max number of undos. It didn't occur to me that the file is overwritten rather than created and the actual edl would only know about the most recent at the time of the last edl save. Once I realized I needed to click on the heading and display modification time rather than the default, I was good - although I don't think windows remembers this view (which is propagated into the saw open file menu) through reboots.

[Todd R]

its not a SAW problem its an OS problem, as the file system doesn't have any idea what 10 and 100 are, just what ascii sequence they are.

If you wan't stuff to order numerically you have to pad the numbers to how ever many number of digits are required. 2, 3, 4, 5, etc

3-digit padding
001
002
120
100

4-digit padding
0001
0002
0003
0130
1500

I've always done labelled things this way...not just an OS thing...in ordering excel entries, etc

another handy thing to learn from my working in TV is to name files with a backwards date to keep things chronological...(also remembering european and US formats are different- in the US you put the month first, which is entirely confusing)

so if you name yer file
TodaysMix_20221219.wav
and then do I mix tomorrow
and name it
TodaysMix_20221220.wav
files wile stay in chronological order in your folders

[bcorkery]

Todd and Philip,

Yes both of these methods are my best practices too!

[Dave Labrecque]

Once I realized I needed to click on the heading and display modification time rather than the default, I was good - although I don't think windows remembers this view (which is propagated into the saw open file menu) through reboots.

Have you tried saving the default File Explorer display of your choice through the View/Options/Change Folder And Search Options (Folder Options)/View/Apply to Folders button? Works for me. My default File Explorer view has Name, Date Modified, Type, and Size column headings only.