Audacity Forum

Bear with me if I don't have various components named correctly for the Audacity software display . . .

The timeline for an open audio file (below the tool bar, but above the audio display) is measured in minutes and seconds, but a label track seems to be measured in accumulative seconds, i.e., two minutes is given as 120 seconds. When I tag parts of an interview in preparation to edit, then save the label track as a text list, all the timeline reference points are converted from the familiar minutes:seconds format into a total number of seconds . . . right down to the hundred thousandth of a second . . . and I have to use a calculator to figure out where to find that referernce point in the audio track.

Does anyone know whether there is a way to convert the label track feature to the minute-seconds format, same as used in the editing display? Thanks!

I'm on a Macintosh, if that makes a difference . . .

Michal Thompson
Hillsboro, Oregon

Pardon, but why are you trying to read the times from the exported labels files and then locate those times on the timeline? If you have the label track open in audacity you can click on the first label and then use tab to move through to the label you want to reach, without having to read off the time code anywhere. You can always use File > Import Labels to import an existing label file into audacity.

The format used for importing and exporting label tracks is primarily intended for getting to and from other programs, or editing the label text in a text editor. As such the time format is only ever decimal seconds because it is much the easiest format to read and write reliably.

When I edit an interview into a single track of narration for a slide show, parts of the interview are rearranged, sometimes rearranged within sentences. It is far easier to use a printout of the exported label track for the editing process than the actual label track. Yes, I can go back to the label track and search for the same tag, but I often have to run the calculation converting seconds to minutes-and-seconds to find that tag. It would be faster if I could convert one or the other to coordinate their time reference displays.

Maybe that can't be done with this software.

Can't you just set the time display in audacity to be "seconds" in that case? This is certainly an option in 1.3.x, and would mean that the label list and the interface use the same units (seconds and decimals of them).