Because of some very recent components in my computer I have to use one of the rather ‘current’ Linux distros, and unfortunately until now the packaged Audacity used to crash sometimes after a long time spent editing on large projects. This has never been more than an annoyance since the old file structure seemed to be saved on every change somehow. I have never knowingly lost any part of my work and I value this very much. Thank you for this design!
Now I’ve read your version 3.0.0 announcement in which it says that saving a project in the new format would take considerably more time. Does this mean I’m going to lose my changes in 3.0.0 when the programme crashes?
If so I’d put the Audacity package on version hold for now, I just need to know.
No. It means the opposite - the new format should be more robust against failure because each transaction between the application and the project data is “atomic” - it should be virtually impossible for an incomplete write to the project to occur,
Note that while Audacity 3 can read Audacity 2 projects, Audacity 2 cannot read Audacity 3 projects, so you should avoid creating important projects in Audacity 3.0.0 until you are sure that you intend to stick with Audacity 3.
It’s not normally the saving that takes longer - it’s when you exit the project that the database does what is known as “Compaction” where it gets rid if all the temporary now-unused space that is still hanging around in the database.
This is a very non-technical description - but I am decidedly non-techy these days.)