Audacity Forum

Is it possible -- and if so, how? -- to automatically divide a long (50-60 minutes) WAV file into smaller files of the exact same length (let's say 5 minutes) by "telling" Audacity to insert labels at 5 minute intervals?

I usually do this manually, putting a label at the beginning and end of each song and then exporting the labels -- which gives me X number of individual files, one for each song.

That's my preference when I know I want the CD I'll burn of those songs (live concert recordings) to be similar to a commercially produced CD, so I can select any given track and know it will be the beginning of the song I want to listen to.

But sometimes I don't want to go to that much trouble -- figuring out exactly where the longer file needs to be split -- for recordings I don't expect to listen to very often, if at all. But instead of those recordings -- the CDs -- being one long track, in which finding any particular song is hard, I'd like to be able to split it into tracks of 5 minutes.

I can do that manually, but if it could be done "automatically" -- with a few steps -- that'd be even better.

Thanks!

Carey

Try Analyse > Regular Interval Labels.

-- Bill

Thanks, but............

Under Analyze in my version (1.2.6), I don't seem to have that as one of the choices.

All I have is:
* Plot Spectrum
* Beat Finder
* Silence Finder

Is that a newer option than my version of Audacity had?

Carey wrote:Under Analyze in my version (1.2.6), I don't seem to have that as one of the choices.

Ah, yes. You're in the 1.3.x forum so I assumed you had 1.3.x.

You may want to upgrade.

-- Bill

Sorry about that! That's happened a few times, and I've tried to make sure I was in the right place, but obviously failed this time.

I'd decided, since I've been trouble free and probably not in need of most of whatever improvements/additions the newer version has, to stick with the old version and not risk potential problems.

While waiting for the response to my question, I decided to manually insert labels as close to 5 minutes apart as I could in one 65ish minute long WAV, and it probably didn't take much more time than doing it automatically would -- if I had the newer version.

So I think I'll just do that -- until I decide to upgrade.

Thanks very much for the help!

Carey