Hi Jim
As Robbie mentioned, pressing shift-a a second time moves the cursor to
that point and therefore undoes all the good work you did by setting the
beginning of the section to be deleted. Think of most word processors.
If you select several words by pressing control-shift-right arrow and
then just press an arrow key you will undo the highlight. This is similar.
As you have discovered, pressing left and right brackets produces
different results when playing and stoped. When playing, beginning and
end points will be set where you hit the key. You can then use those
key combinations Robbie mentioned and which continue to confuse me or
you can adjust by hitting the bracket keys when not playing and use the
spin boxes to adjust values. I sometimes find it convenient to set the
end point first and then use shift-left arrow to extend the highlight to
the left. Even if I want to select a large region, once some audio is
selected you can then use the left bracket to set the beginning point.
Of course, you need to know where that is before embarking on the process.
Robbie mentioned spacebar for playing the selection and c for playing
before and after the selection. Using c lets you hear what it will
sound like after deleting. Other keys that are really nice are:
shift-f5 plays up to the selection
shift f6 plays a short segment from the start of the selection
shift-f7 plays up to the end of the selection and, you've guessed it
shift-f7 plays after the selection
All of that allows you to make fine adjustments to beginning and end
points of the selection with the left and right brackets. By pressing
the application key when in that dialog you can change how time is
displayed. I prefer hours-minutes-seconds-milliseconds, but many may
find that rather obsessive.
Once you get the hang of it, you will be able to make beautiful edits.
Andrew
On 27/05/2016 11:43 PM, Jim Fettgather wrote:
Hello to Andrew and others on the list.
I have been using Audio Recording programs for about 15 years, but something about this editing process in Audacity is allusive and non-intuitive, after pouring over the manual and all of the hotkeys.
So, I am just trying to edit out a short phrase in an audio file.
Just before the place I would like to edit out, I press Shift A.
Then, ressing the left Bracket key, the dialog comes up with what appears to be the correct position to set the left marker, the place where the selection should start.
Then, pressing Shift A again, the file plays, and pressing Shift A the second time, at what I would think would be the correct place to press the right bracket key to set the end of the selection.
Here is where everything seems to fall apart, as I seem to lose the most of the rest of the audio up to the end of the file.
Now, I have discovered that if I do not stop the file at all, and just press left bracket, and then right bracket a few seconds later, that method seems to always work for selecting and then pressing Control K or delete.
However, that is a difficult way to do precise editing.
What am I mmissing? There has to be a simple concept that I am not understanding about how to set two marks, presumably with the left and right bracket keys, to simply edit out a small piece of audio.
I have been obsessing about this, as I say, reading and re-reading manuals, so I am hopeing that a kind list member may offer just a clue as to what I am doing incorrectluy.
I really appreciated the tip about pressing Shift A, but please let me know if there is another step that I am missing.
Thanks.
-----Original Message----- From: Andrew Downie
Sent: Wednesday, May 25, 2016 5:22 PM
To: audacity4blind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [audacity4blind] Re: New User with an Editing Question
Hi Jim
On the general point of using Audacity with various screen readers, at a
fundamental level it makes little or no difference. I have used it with
NVDA, Window-Eyes and JAWS and, apart from a few idiosyncratic
situations there is no difference. I haven't used the JAWS scripts and
assume they had embellishments but I can't say I feel the need for more
feedback than I get with NVDA.
You mentioned tutorials and the like. All very useful and don't forget
the well-written manual that comes with Audacity.
Now to the issue of being returned to the start of the file when
pressing spacebar. If you stop play with shift-a instead of the
spacebar your cursor will be at that position. If you press left
bracket ([) when playing the cursor will be placed there while play
continues. Pressing right bracket (]) when playing will set that point
as the end point of the section to be edited. If you press left or
right bracket when not playing you will be presented with a dialog to
set the beginning and end respectively of the highlighted area. I have
found that most valuable. Having set a highlighted region, pressing
spacebar will play it and only it. You can make fine adjustments with
those left and right brackets. There are also several other options for
extending or contracting the highlighted area. When you have some time
on your hands, go into Preferences (ctrl-p) and check out under Keyboard
the keys already assigned to functions.
Andrew
On 25/05/2016 11:29 PM, Jim Fettgather wrote:
Regarding the suggestions below for editing in Audacity:
You've probably pressed pause instead of stop.
Ensure that:
- stop is pressed
- the track itself is selected (enter key)
- a selection region is defined (with the brackets, shift + j/K or the
selection controls)
I have ensured that the track is selected by pressing Enter.
It seems as if you press Space Bar to stop, in order to make an edit at the current location, you are returned to the beginning of the file.
If I understand correctly, you cannot press P to pause in order to edit, but must press space bar to stop.
If that is the case, is there something that needs to be done so that you are not returned to the beginning of the file?
Thanks for input on what I know to be very basic concepts for experienced users.
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