Issue with Project Logical Editor Mixer /Add Track To Selected: Group Channel

I am trying to use the Project Logical Editor (PLE) to create a group with the tracks matching certain criteria. This is a normal Cubase right lick menu option. You select the tracks, right click, choose “Add track” and then choose “Group Channel to Selected Channels”.

In the PLE I created a new preset using “Select” to highlight the tracks and as post-process command I entered “Mixer /Add Track To Selected: Group Channel”. I supposed that this is a somewhat differently formulated version of “Group Channel to Selected Channels”. If I do this only the first of the highlighted tracks is included in the new group. So not what I want.

One the other hand if I put a random post processing command like for example “File/save” before the “Mixer /Add Track To Selected: Group Channel” it works correctly and all highlighted tracks are added to the new group.

Why is this? This command should work without a requirement for this dummy command line.

(PS there is a Macro available which first creates a new folder and then a new group. That also works as the creation of the new folder is the dummy command. I do not want such an un-named folder however)

I’ve seen other strange results when using pre/post processing commands in the PLE, which I attribute to timing issues, but much better luck when resorting to creating a macro with the PLE preset included instead. One might think the two approaches should yield the same result, but in my experience it is not always the case.

And you correctly do so, since there are asynchronous operations (plenty of cases in a DAW) for which there should be a way to “wait for their execution” before proceeding to the next command.
Happens in macros and PLEs. The way I see, there’s just one command missing from this environment: A “Wait for…”. I have to guess - due to the complexity of Cubendo - that this is not an easy one to add, so, in the mean time, a less demanding one could be a “Sleep for (some) ms”.
I saw workarounds in this forum, as the one @mavros already mentioned (the “Save” command in order to halt the process and move on later).
The good news is that for guys like you and me who are into scripting, this is actually achievable, i.e. placing a delay between command sequenced in an array. The bad news is that not everyone is (or should be) scripting, while even when someone is into scripting, this doesn’t necessarily mean that he/she is happy with fixing this matter using delays :slight_smile: Delays can always fail us, when we’re talking about asynchronous operations.

Although I have not performed any scientific tests, I have found occasions where using pre/post commands had an undesirable result but rewriting it as a macro, using the same commands pre and post the PLE, surprisingly worked fine.

Thanks for the quick and very helpful input.

I created macros each with two commands for all sections of the orchestra I want to group. The first command is to run the PLE selection script and the second one the “Mixer /Add Track To Selected: Group Channel”. That works perfectly.

By the way the PLE indeed has some other weird issues. In the select list for high woodwinds I wanted to highlight tracks with names containing all the different high WW instrument names. For some reason all but the first line with “Name CONTAINS piccolo” are highlighted. To get the piccolo track highlighted as well, I have to put a dummy first criterion and add the piccolo as a second line. Maybe again a timing issue.

It’s quite weird this problem with the name contains Piccolo
I do it this way.
and it works very well

It is the first line after content type line which is somehow skipped. If I put « contains flute » instead of piccolo, the tracks with flutes will not be selected. Anyway all works now with the minor workaround…

After the group tracks I use a macro combined with LPE select criteria to create the. number of FX tracks needed and bring the instrument groups and these FX channels together in the master mix bus (also a group channel).

The only limit seems to be that you cannot enter text using these macro or LPE commands lines e.g. to name the group tracks automatically.