Audacity Stopped Responding doing Timeshift under SyncLock

Audacity Help Forum Windows
1

I am playing around with Audacity, trying to improve my understanding of the SyncLock feature. I copied an existing .aup file, together with its associated _data folder to a different parent folder. I then launched the project into Audacity and deleted tracks to reduce the number from 49 to something more manageable but still typical of my work (fifteen of them). I added two label tracks, positioned after the first five and after the next five. I then tried to use SyncLock to lock the middle group and then timeshift them as a block. I failed. I reset SyncLock. Switched my attention to the top group, engaged SyncLock and was able to Timeshift the block to the right. Why did one work and not the other? Don’t know and it’s not immediately important.

As I timeshifted the block back to the left, just before I got the alignment with position zero on the timeline, I got the warning window pop-up advising that Audacity had stopped responding and that Windows was searching for a solution. I let that run for a while and then cancelled. I then double-clicked the .aup file to re-lauch it and was given the “Audacity can recover…” window. I selected the option to Recover Project. It seems to have recovered correctly but along the way I was prompted to do Help > Show Log. The text from the log is included below:

14:15:34: Audacity 2.0.1
14:15:35: Error: Couldn't find symbol 'MainPanelFunc' in a dynamic library (error 127: the specified procedure could not be found.)
14:15:35: Trying to load FFmpeg libraries...
14:15:35: mLibAVFormatPath ('C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacityavformat-52.dll') is not empty. Loading from it.
14:15:35: Looking up PATH environment variable...
14:15:35: PATH = 'C:Windowssystem32;C:Windows;C:Windowssystem32wbem;C:WindowsSystem32WindowsPowerShellv1.0;C:Program Files (x86)Common FilesRoxio SharedDLLShared;C:Program Files (x86)Common FilesRoxio Shared13.0DLLShared;C:Program Files (x86)Common FilesRoxio SharedDLLShared;C:Program Files (x86)Common FilesRoxio SharedDLLShared;C:Program Files (x86)Common FilesRoxio Shared13.0DLLShared'
14:15:35: Checking that 'C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacity' is in PATH...
14:15:35: Warning: FFmpeg directory is not in PATH.
14:15:35: Temporarily appending ';C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacity' to PATH...
14:15:35: Checking for monolithic avformat from 'C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacityavformat-52.dll'.
14:15:35: Error: Couldn't find symbol 'avutil_version' in a dynamic library (error 127: the specified procedure could not be found.)
14:15:35: avformat not monolithic
14:15:35: Loading avutil from 'C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacityavutil-50.dll'.
14:15:35: Loading avcodec from 'C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacityavcodec-52.dll'.
14:15:35: Loading avformat from 'C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacityavformat-52.dll'.
14:15:35: Returning PATH to previous setting...
14:15:35: Actual avutil path C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacityavutil-50.dll
14:15:35: Actual avcodec path C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacityavcodec-52.dll
14:15:35: Actual avformat path C:Program Files (x86)FFmpeg for Audacityavformat-52.dll
14:15:35: Importing symbols...
14:15:35: All symbols loaded successfully. Initializing the library.
14:15:35: Retrieving FFmpeg library version numbers:
14:15:35:    AVCodec version 0x342000 - 52.32.0 (built against 0x344802 - 52.72.2)
14:15:35:    AVFormat version 0x342400 - 52.36.0 (built against 0x344002 - 52.64.2)
14:15:35:    AVUtil version 0x320300 - 50.3.0 (built against 0x320f01 - 50.15.1)
14:15:35: FFmpeg libraries loaded successfully.
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000056.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e00001c3.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e00001c9.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000206.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e00003f9.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e000049e.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000723.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e000090b.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e00009d0.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000b1f.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000bc5.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000bfd.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000c57.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000cf9.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000e8f.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000ebe.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000f66.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000f8d.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000fc9.au'
14:15:49: Warning: Orphan block file: 'J:My DataMy PlaypenSoundSyncLockTest_datae00d00e0000fdd.au'
14:15:49: Warning:    Project check ignored orphan block file(s). They will be deleted when project is saved.
14:15:49: Warning: Project check found file inconsistencies inspecting the loaded project data.

I’m guessing the orphan blocks might relate to the tracks I deleted.

I still haven’t worked out a sequence of steps that will, repeatably, set up and use SyncLock. If I’m going to get crashes every time I try, I am not going to make any headway on this. When it works, I can see the benefit to my workflow; but I have to be able to repeat the desired effect without the undesired one!

regards,
Peter

2

Thanks for reporting the possible problem.

I cannot reproduce a problem where one group of five sync-locked tracks and a label track does not time shift and other groups shift (nor do I see a crash dragging a group towards zero).

The fact that you could not drag a group suggests something is wrong.

If you can still reproduce the non-drag and/or crash in that project, is it possible to zip the .aup file and _data folder and upload it somewhere:
http://www.yousendit.com
http://www.sendspace.com
http://minus.com/ ?

If Audacity crashes with an Undo history and so cannot clean the history up, the .au files that would have been used for undo/redo will appear as orphans in the .aup file.



Gale

3

Gale,
I’ve done a lot more testing with SyncLock and cannot reproduce the crash. It looks like it has been a “one off” occurence. If it does recur, what exact steps should I take to capture good diagnostic data for you? Would taking a copy of the aup file and data folder before attempting a restart and recovery be the right thing? Would you need anything else?

4

Very often if a project becomes corrupted, it remains like that after recovery and project save, and the problem that caused the crash is still repeatable.

After the crash, the .aup will still be in the project state in which you last saved it. So if you didn’t explicitly File > Save while the project was open, the .aup could represent a project state long before the crash situation that is represented by the state of the current autosave (temporary .aup) file and _data folder. If there has been a crash it is often best after recovering the project to File > Save Project As to a different name. In that case you will still have the original .aup if needed.

So really, a copy of the .aup and _data folder before you recover isn’t usually that useful, unless things are going on like files moving around when reopening the project after the crash (which can very occasionally happen due to bugs).

The neatest thing to do from a purely diagnostic point of view is to try to repeat the step that crashed as soon as you have recovered the project. If you can do that and there is a crash, then a copy of the autosave folder and the _data folder is what’s wanted.

However with reference to your topic https://forum.audacityteam.org/t/synclock-tracks-the-biggest-mystery-of-them-all/25847/1 we may need this project to find out why the sync-locked tracks won’t drag.


Gale