No I’m not saying that. Some file types may be exclusive to certain programs while certain other file types such as .wav files are commonly shared between different programs. You recognise each file type according to the file extension. To be honest, to understand this fully you could go and look up on the internet how Windows manages files. This is one of the basic foundations of the Windows OS.
No I’m not saying that either. A programmer may well choose to create a new unique file extension to be used for that particular program. But many file types are common to several programs. In other words, Wavelab can open and save .wav files but so can Audacity.
You would understand this better if you first tried showing the file extensions in Windows Explorer, as we’ve already suggested a couple of times in this thread. Forget icons and think about file types and file extensions.
@mr.roos I wathed your video and it confirms what I said earlier.
But I also noticed something in the beginning, where you show the 3 directories. You show the WL directory with .wav files inside (I can tell since the peak files have .wav in their names) and then you show the RX7 directory with also .wav files inside. They will OFCOURSE show with the WL icon, since you told Windows to open .wav files with Wavelab. Then in the Cubase directory you say all is good now, but the file types you show here are .cpr (one of the columns identifies them as such: Cubase Project File). Ofcourse there is no issue here, a Cubase Project File is not a wave file. If you would take a look in a Cubase project’s AUDIO directory you will also see the .wav files showing with the WL icon.
Now you say you ‘change the icon’ and you do so in the RX directory. What you are actually doing is changing the default program Windows will use to open these same.wav files as before with a different program by double clicking (It says so in the dialog you click on: ‘Open With’). Yes, now they show with an RX icon everywhere you look (also in the Cubase Audio directories). This is perfectly normal and just how Windows works and has done for decades.
Bottom line: whichever icon shows with your .wav files will only tell Windows how to open that file with double clicking. Give it a try: In one of your directories with the ‘wrong’ icon, RIGHT click on a file and select Open With and then select the ‘right’ software. Works always.
Stingray, maybe we are having a semantics problem here. The WL logo is an icon, can we agree on this? When this WL logo/icon is attached to a file it becomes specific to that program, can we agree on this? This logo/icon, at the point that we find it attached to a file, has become a cohesive part of (in this case) another file (I suppose, if we want to try to break it up), a ‘.wav’ file. And for the record Windows describes this specific WL file here:
“TYPE OF FILE: WaveLab Pro 10.0 (.wav)”. See the attached screen shot.
Saved Cubase files that are tagged with the Cubase logo/icon are described by Windows as:
"Type of file: Cubase Project (.cpr)
OK, so searching a computer via Windows Explorer? Search for what? If I search for Music I won’t find WL files. If I search for .wav files I will find WL and RX7, but no Cubase files. If I search for .cpr files I will find Cubase. What’s the point of this search? I know where my files are and what they should be called.
Arjan, you make an interesting point, but what you are saying is not accurate. I say this because this only started 3 days ago and until that time, the RX7.wav files and the WL.wav files WERE able to be labeled for use by each respective program - not to be opened by the other program. I’m not making this up. And if what you are saying is TRUE…then PG has suddenly changed his file type from what it was. And I say this because the RX7 program has not updated for 6 months. So are you putting my troubles on PG’s back? This still does not explain why saved Cubase files were (albeit for a brief time) also in the loop.
No - that is where you are already wrong. The icon is not attached to the file (only the extension is, which is why people suggested you set Windows to show them), it is merely displayed by Windows to remind you what will happen if you double-click on that file in explorer on that computer. It does nothing else. If you look at the file from another computer over the network, the icon shown will correspond to the association on that computer, which may be different. Also, the only link between the file and the program whose icon is shown is that the double-click will open that program - but you are not prevented from opening that file in other programs, either from the program concerned, or even from explorer using the right-click menu.
When Windows talks of the “Type” of a file, it is trying to make things easier for the general user - however, as soon as more than one program can handle that kind of file, this becomes positively misleading. By calling the file association a “type”, and by hiding the file extension by default, Windows is trying two ways to confuse you…
Don’t forget that you can right click any file and pick which application to open it within. No matter what default association exists.
As you think something has changed is it possible that you are saving as wav files now, but had previously saved in different formats such as. aiff or. w64?
Skijumptoes, thanks for that info, and it will help. All of my saved files were either 16bit/44.1 KHz or 24bit/48KHz files.
Here’s how things went… 4 days ago all three programs were independent of each other in regards to their particular program saved files, each marked with the particular programs logo/icon. Five days ago there was a Win10 update and I installed it. And then, next day, the updates for Cubase 10.0.60 arrived, along with WL 10.0.30. I downloaded these and installed them. At this point the Cubase and WL saved files were still independent of each other, each marked/labeled accordingly. I hadn’t open RX7at this point. So 3 days ago, I was trying out the External EFX option in WL, going out and back to WL thru an analog comp and recording the results. All good. I still hadn’t looked at the RX7 saved files but I wanted to try going out of WL to the RX7 program for external editing as well. I tried this and it didn’t work, it was a fail on the return. So I closed WL and opened Cubase to try the process there. It was also a fail. This was when I started to look at my various saved files in all three programs. When I opened the saved files in RX7, I saw that they were all WL labeled. So I changed them to open with RX7. And then I opened the saved WL files and saw that they were all labeled RX7 files. So I changed those to WL versions. Then I looked at the saved RX7 files and saw that they had reverted to WL labeled files. This was a new thing, it was never this way before, they were always marked as files created by the particular program I had saved them from. So on a whim I opened the Cubase saved files and saw that they were also tagged as WL files. I went to change a Cubase file (labeled as a WL file) to open with Cubase, and then I went to the WL folder and the RX7 folder to see if they were intact - all the files were now labeled as Cubase files. And honestly I did this about 20 times swapping the ‘Open with’ any of the three programs and each time all three saved program folders files would change to the one I had chosen. I’m not making this up. So I posted here about this, assuming someone else might be experiencing the same thing. Apparently not.
So yesterday I was actually making my YT video and I opened the three folders containing the various saved files for the three programs - and the Cubase folder files were labeled as Cubase. When you realize that the Cubase files are .cpr files it seems impossible that they could have been marked as files to be opened by programs that can only open .wav files, right? But this was the case.
That’s my story. I’ve also contacted iZotope about this and linked the video. When you see the behavior that occurs as the folder in RX7 is double clicked and opens in WL, the track is played, and then when WL is closed, RX7 opens automatically as if to edit the played track… Well this is crazy behavior. Haha, and although I will admit that the automation affect of these events happening is pretty amazing on one level, at the same time you realize that NONE of this was planned by the ppl who created the programs. It’s completely off the rails.
mr.roos - i think what may help you is if you enable ‘File Name Extensions’ within windows file explorer, this will show ALL file extensions:-
Then you can widen the filename column in explorer so you can view the file extension of each file when browsing your folders.
Windows can only default one program to each file extension, so i’m hoping that if you can see file extension (.wav .cpr etc) of known files it may help you work out what’s happened? Particularly if you browse to where your older files are, as they will have the original file extensions.
It’s entirely possible you’re saving out as a new file format (extension) since the updates… maybe(lol)?!
John, I thank you for this input, but I have a question. When you open your saved WL files and double-click on the GM file found there, does it open in WL? For the sake of organizing your work, doesn’t it make better sense that it would? Seriously, in the current world of so many audio programs available and with what someone might be using, I think it would be better to make each saved file unique to the program. If there were a way to control this in WL I would do it in a heartbeat - because - this is what I used to have, and the programs didn’t contaminate each other like you see at the end of my video. Haha, and this is what I used to have, actually!
Cubase has this right I think, with creating a unique file type, as does HOFA and iZotope Ozone 9. And I’m telling you sincerely - even though I can’t revert to the former behavior - that the files in RX7 and WL10 (any version prior to 10.0.30) were somehow unique, despite the fact that their extensions are both .wav. And that deal you see happening at the end of my video where RX7 thinks it is on an Edit Quest when it is not? Well, this NEVER happened before.
Paul, I did not have this box checked but it is now, thank you, it may give me a headsup in the future.
You can only do with a file what Windows enables you to do, and associating separate examples of the same kind of file (Wave, in this discussion) with different programs is not one of those things. However, each of the programs also has some kind of project system of their own, and these have different extensions specifically so that they can be uniquely associated with the correct program. Opening one of those projects would, of course, bring back the required Wave files without Windows or the icon it currently shows for them being involved.
A wav file is a Windows file type that was developed so one could create them and edit them to store digital sound. What program you use to do this is up to you. Think about it. Wavelab is a wavfile editor. Its even in its name. What good would it be if it only created or saved files that could only be used within it? Some programs do make files that can only be used by them. A wave editor is meant to work with all wave files. It will save them so any other wave editor can open them too. BTW wave files have been around longer than Wavelab. Don’t confuse WL project files with the audio files within those project. Think of wav files as audio files, which they are. If you want to be able to open a wav file in WL by double clicking you must set Wavelab as the default for that. Otherwise it will open in Groove Music. Cubase also reads and creates wav files. So does a lot of other programs. They are handled the same way by all of them.
I have never wanted or thought I needed a generic file type to only open in only one program. It has never been an issue.
Point of interest. Sound Forge is also a wav file editor that creates side car files (.sfk) that tell it about the wav file. It will open any wav file too.
When you ask about GM I think General MIDI. Is that what you mean?
I have been very frustrated in this thread and I think you too Mr. Roos have been also. Yet you have conducted yourself very well indeed. You are a gentleman . I thank you for the how well you have handled yourself here.
Thanks, John, I feel the same about your advice and comments here. Everyone here is trying to get to the same place, make some music, I hope.
In my small world, I have no one to talk with regarding music making software. This forum is really it for me and I’m glad to be able to ask a question and express my confusion in an open forum. I am still not clear why my file system behaved ‘incorrectly’ for at least a year and 4 months running Win10. I’m sure, too, that there are those here that might still think this impossible, and that’s OK, too. I haven’t heard back from Izotope and they may be equally confused by what I’ve said but, oh well. Honestly, I will miss what I had, but, well, if everybody else is getting by like this then I will join the party.
Haha, and as to the ‘GM’ item, that was ‘Groove Music’ and you answered the question that I had about it…
