Ableton cannot find samples that have barely moved?!

[ollyb303]

this is how I do
go to the missing files list..
above.. automatic search
(exclude search in library..)
point it to the directory..
and if all the files are there and have unique names..
it's done..
just hit save at the bottom.

This usually works well for me too. Never had any issues finding samples unless they've been removed from the hard drive entirely.

Yup, this works for me.

[alexjholland]

This is ridiculous. Despite telling it only to check my 'samples' folder (which is in my 'documents' folder) it's searching my entire 'documents' folder, including all my aperture/iphoto collection.

What a sorry state of affairs..

[Karlstens]

Hopefully Ableton will hear me out on this. I love their software, brilliant stuff, but haven't really requested a feature enhancement until this evening.

I might add that this problem is extremely easy to solve from a programmers perspective, so it'd be great if it could be added to Ableton Live 8.

A few things have started happening recently, specifically with the cloud. More and more users are using Dropbox, which I consider a "dumb" solution for syncing files. Those of you who are absolutely serious about syncing along with backing up files & folders should be looking for a better solution than Dropbox. My research has lead me to the program SpiderOak. (A bit of digging around will get you ~6 gig free with SpiderOak)

Now, when a user is using SpiderOak (or alas, dropbox), no doubt they're sharing files across two clients. Usually one client will be a desktop and the other will be a laptop, but both will have different folder structures.

SpiderOak has a MASSIVE advantage over Dropbox, in that it can sync any backed up directory on client 1 with any backed up directory on client 2, and is unlimited in the amount of folder synchronise tasks created. (This is in comparison to the one "Dropbox" directory Dropbox gives you (plus subdirectories)).

So naturally, SpiderOak has the advantage in that you don't have to shuffle files or folders anywhere, at all. Things will just backup and sync from their native/default directory. Below, let's look at the two clients in my example;

Client 1:
Desktop Client
C:\Windows, Program Files, User
L:\Libraries, VSTs, Samples

Client 2:
C:\Windows, Program Files, User Directory, Libraries, VSTs, Samples

Coincidentally, both Client 1 & 2 have the same C:\
C:\Users\Burningfeetman\Documents\Ableton\Projects
With the main different of Client 1 desktop having a dedicated L:\Libraries folder, whilst Client 2 laptop has C:\Users\Burningfeetman\Documents\Libraries. Within these identical Library folders, gigs and gigs of delicious samples, too many to upload to any cloud.

This is where Ableton needs to fill in the missing link. I might be wrong on this, but it seems that Ableton Live lacks a client side option for Live which allows the user to specify a directory to a common sample library. Example, on client 1, via a Live preference setting, my samples library will point to;
"General Library" - L:\Libraries\
and on client 2;
"General Library" - C:\Users\Burningfeetman\Documents\Libraries

Further to this, why stop at one? Another example;
"Big Fish Audio" - L:\Libraries\Big Fish Audio
and on client 2;
"Big Fish Audio" - C:\Users\Burningfeetman\Documents\Libraries\Big Fish Audio

As the Live set is opened on either client, it will look for the "Big Fish Audio" Library, and so long as the contents on both client 1 and 2 match, there would be no missing samples error.

Personally, I hope someone can correct me by pointing myself to this already existing functionality in Ableton Live. Obviously I did have a quick look, but couldn't find it. Further to this, if there's a more official way to send Ableton a feature enhancement request, by all means, let me know!

Cheers,
BFM

[friend_kami]

honestly, live should have a freaking option to select collect all and save (+ sub selection, such as recordings, including library samples and whatnots). when i was sitting with a hackintosh all i had to do was to setup a keyboard shortcut to do it for me, pressing ctrl+s would collect all and save, no problems there. now i'm back on windows and am getting incresingly infuriated that this goddamned company still haven't figured out that users wants to specify their own shortcuts. especially when you consider how incredibly unergonomic some of their goddamned shortcuts are.

granted, i did just buy session drums, but as it stands now, unless they release an update that will absolutely blow my freaking mind right out of the back of my skull i will only live as a drum-instrument and nothing more. possibly even sell the whole shit all together. who the fuck cartes about a new beta that only introduces an auto-update feature, if the autoupdates contains one or two minor bugfixes while we still have a software that, at version 8 and in 10 years or so in the making still fails so immensly on the most common tasks, like moving a video track and bam crash.

editing a track, bam crash. wahu, insert a looper that randomly plays back cleared buffers and random intervals, and the all too exciting random not enough memory crashes for no apparent reason, be it a full huge project or just one track with nothing in it.

live was damned exciting back then. now it feels like a bloated old dinosaur who can't keep up with the competition, and can't even bother to satisfy the few loyal customers that are still here by actually providing a useful (and somewhat stable) update.
everytime i shut down live my cpu kicks up to 25% useage and it hangs in the memory for 5 minutes. when i quit it normally.

i am so sick and tired of having to pray to god everytime i zoom in far enough and need to move a small section of audio and hope that it doesn't crash because of godknowswhat fucking bllshit reason. it's like their testsets is compromised out of 3 tracks: one midi track with an instrument. did it work? check, it's stable. one with an audio input. did that work? check, done. and last but not least, send some audio to a bus track. did that work? check. ready to market.

[H20nly]

honestly, live should have a freaking option to select collect all and save

if you really hate using a mouse then the Alt key is your friend.

press Alt to select 'File' from the menu
press down arrow to highlight 'Collect All and Save'
press 'Enter'

[friend_kami]

honestly, live should have a freaking option to select collect all and save

if you really hate using a mouse then the Alt key is your friend.

press Alt to select 'File' from the menu
press down arrow to highlight 'Collect All and Save'
press 'Enter'

yes, because i really like to waste extra time when i could just set up a custom keyboard shortcut and use the most common thing my hands know when working with a computer: ctrl+s.
workarounds is all fine and dandy but it doesn't solve the core problem: we don't have custom keyboard shurtcuts.
the question is: why?

[H20nly]

that i don't know...

but i was hoping that the workaround might give you a little relief.

i think custom shortcuts might be a lazy company's way of handling the issue of deciding what to use for their software's shortcuts.

on the other hand, keyboard shortcuts might be part of a file in Live that could be modified... in a text editor for example. have you ever asked support about it and got an official stance?

[H20nly]

also... isn't it true that once you do a Collect All and Save you would not need to do one again unless you brought in samples from an external location?

so if you save your project as you work on it... get to a good point where you have added all the external samples...then Collect All and Save... after that all your edits could be saved by pressing ctrl + S. no?

[friend_kami]

also... isn't it true that once you do a Collect All and Save you would not need to do one again unless you brought in samples from an external location?

so if you save your project as you work on it... get to a good point where you have added all the external samples...then Collect All and Save... after that all your edits could be saved by pressing ctrl + S. no?

afaik, no.

[ollyb303]

also... isn't it true that once you do a Collect All and Save you would not need to do one again unless you brought in samples from an external location?

so if you save your project as you work on it... get to a good point where you have added all the external samples...then Collect All and Save... after that all your edits could be saved by pressing ctrl + S. no?

afaik, no.

Yes.

[JuanSOLO]

in computers... there isn't such a thing as 'barely'...

thread answered.

[snakedogman]

btw, while this is also a workaround of sorts, you can get cunstom shortcuts using Autohotkey on Windows. Yes it would be nice if it would be built in by Ableton, but if it really bothers you so much I'd say you're better off using the workaround that's available rather than get all worked up about the fact that it's not been done for you by Ableton.

[friend_kami]

btw, while this is also a workaround of sorts, you can get cunstom shortcuts using Autohotkey on Windows. Yes it would be nice if it would be built in by Ableton, but if it really bothers you so much I'd say you're better off using the workaround that's available rather than get all worked up about the fact that it's not been done for you by Ableton.

that particular thing does bother me and i do already have an autohotkey script for it, but that's not the point. the point is that we don't have custom shortcuts and i really do fail to understand why. granted mac daw's doesn't have that but that's not neccesary since osx can do that natively, but most of the daws these days on the windows side does have it because they understand that it's important for their users to have a custom workflow according to their own ergonomics.

as for pulling in samples then save all once and never bother it again would work unless you work like i do which is cutting down millions of samples into microscopic pieces and building new things from them and reprocess them then start the process all over again. it depends on your workflow, as i said. i really fail to understand why there's no default option for this since this is the most failproof way to safeguard yourself from broken projects. i would settle for a hardcoded shortcut if nothing else, but as it stands now there is no shortcut for it at all, and i really really don't understand why.

[H20nly]

the point is that we don't have custom shortcuts and i really do fail to understand why. granted mac daw's doesn't have that but that's not neccesary since osx can do that natively, but most of the daws these days on the windows side does have it because they understand that it's important for their users to have a custom workflow according to their own ergonomics.

there is nothing more ergonomic about ctrl + x then there is about ctrl + y or ctrl + z etc etc. regardless of how you decide to lay it out... the ergonomic impact does not really change.

as for pulling in samples then save all once and never bother it again would work unless you work like i do which is cutting down millions of samples into microscopic pieces and building new things from them and reprocess them then start the process all over again.

again, you only have to do a Collect All and Save when you introduce new material into the project... not audio recorded straight into the project, but when you pull [new] samples from elsewhere. edits to existing samples (after you have used the Collect All and Save option) are just changes to the .als so ctrl + S is your huckleberry.

[friend_kami]

the point is that we don't have custom shortcuts and i really do fail to understand why. granted mac daw's doesn't have that but that's not neccesary since osx can do that natively, but most of the daws these days on the windows side does have it because they understand that it's important for their users to have a custom workflow according to their own ergonomics.

there is nothing more ergonomic about ctrl + x then there is about ctrl + y or ctrl + z etc etc. regardless of how you decide to lay it out... the ergonomic impact does not really change.

as for pulling in samples then save all once and never bother it again would work unless you work like i do which is cutting down millions of samples into microscopic pieces and building new things from them and reprocess them then start the process all over again.

again, you only have to do a Collect All and Save when you introduce new material into the project... not audio recorded straight into the project, but when you pull [new] samples from elsewhere. edits to existing samples (after you have used the Collect All and Save option) are just changes to the .als so ctrl + S is your huckleberry.

well, i introduce new samples all the time, as such is the nature of most of the music that i do. making an impact sound from 10 different sounds. consolidate, record, reprocess. go on to the next element. could surely work for my nonelectronic things though, but hardly for the electronic stuff, as new samples are introduced all the time, no matter how small or insignificant they may seem.