Even if you are a regular Audacity user, you might not know that there are a lot number of features or commands that are not directly available in the menus. These options are hard to find. But, they are present in the ‘Transport’ option in the ‘Extra’ menu.
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These features can be really useful in a number of ways. This list is present in the ‘Transport’ sub-menu. Let us look at each of them closely.
Some Transport features
- Play and Stop keys:
These options lets you stop or play the current audio track. You can do the same functionality with keyboard keys. Conversely, you can also use the buttons present in the control panel.
- Play 1 second:
This option will let you play the currently selected audio by only one second. This one second is counted from the current position of the cursor. This can be useful in case you have already recorded some track. Or, if you are in the editing process, and want to listen just a second to focus some particular point in the track. You can directly use this option.
- Play to Selection:
This is a very useful tool. You can play the audio track right from the current position of the cursor. Before using this feature, you should set the cursor position from where you want to play the audio.
- Play after/before the selected start:
Using this feature, you can play the audio for short lengths of time, before or after the starting point of the audio. The user generally selects the starting point of the audio. Also, you can use the keyboard shortcut Shift +F5 to play ‘Before’ , and Shift+F6 to play ‘after’ the selected start.
- Play after/before the selected end:
This option lets you play audio after the end that the user selects. Using this, the user can play the audio for a short interval of time. For ease of use, the shortcut Shift +F7 plays ‘Before’ and Shift+F8 plays ‘after’ the selected end of the audio.
- Both ‘Before’ and ‘After’:
Use the keyboard keys combination ‘Ctrl + shift +F5’ to play the audio before and after the selection start, in addition to the actual length of the audio selected. You can also do the same with respect to the selected end of the audio. Press the key combination – ‘Ctrl +Shift+F7’ to add a short length of audio before and after the audio- while playing it!
- Cut preview option:
As the name suggests, it is akin to the preview option we use. Consider the case where you want to preview your audio, without actually cutting a part of the audio. This is the same! If you use this option, it will play the whole audio, leaving the selected part of the audio. Isn’t it the same as the cut preview?
Conclusion
All these options are not available directly through the main menus, but are of great usage. You can access these features any time while editing or generating audio tracks by using the keyboard shortcuts. Or, you can access them through the options present in the Transport sub-menu.
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