How does a file become a Project?

[TexasJim]

steve: I've been saying from the get-go: Audacity won't let me SAVE Project. When I hit that instruction, I get the WARNING I posted way back. It says I have to use Export or something, because I have a FILE, not a PROJECT. That hasn't changed. I tried. TexasJim

[steve]

I get the WARNING

Yes, it's a "warning", it's not an "error". It is just telling you that "Save" will create a "Project" and that if you want an "audio file" (such as a ".wav" file) you need to use "Export" rather than "Save".

[kozikowski]

It's the warning Audacity gives to people who think they're saving an Audacity Sound File. They're not. A Project is a collection of files and folders Audacity uses to open your saved editing environment inside Audacity.

Many applications want you to Save your work as a final product and that's the end of it. Audacity isn't like that. To get the final product in Audacity, an MP3 or a WAV sound file, you have to Export one.

Save will give you one of these.



That file and folder make a Project, MyMusic in this case. It's not going to say .proj or .prj or anything like that.

Double click the aup file and it will open the associated _data folder automatically and use the stuff it finds in there to construct your show inside Audacity. You should not be messing around inside the _data folder. One false move and you could make a normal, healthy show not open.

You would want a Project if you want to save all your sound clips, markers, different timelines, positioning information, etc, after Audacity closes. All the stuff a sound file won't do. Projects will not save UNDO, so there is that.

Koz

[TexasJim]

Thanks, steve and Koz: I'm beginning to get the picture. So, if I Export my recordings to a Folder, and when I get all of them done, would I move them as .wav files to a burner program, such as Brasero? TexasJim

[steve]

If you export your recordings as WAV files, you will be able to add them to a CD compilation with Brasero.

[TexasJim]

O.K. steve. Thanks. I've never used Brasero, but a neighbor is a Linux Guru, so I'll pick his brain on that. Maybe I'll get my life's chronicle recorded and burned to CD's before I die. TexasJim