The Audacity Team has announced the release of Audacity v1.3.12 (Beta) for Windows, Mac and Linux/Unix. There are some important bug fixes and improvements, especially for dragging and synchronization of labels.

Also, PACKT Publishing has released a new book about Audacity “Getting started with Audacity 1.3” by Bethany Hiitola. PACKT operate an Open Source Royalty Scheme, and every sale of the new Audacity book will directly benefit the project.

Changes and improvements:

• A hover tooltip is now provided if the Mixer Toolbar input selector cannot control the system slider for the selected input.
• More intuitive behavior when moving and resizing labels by dragging.
• Support added for importing lists of files (LOF) containing relative paths.
• Export Multiple: new option to use a numerical prefix before existing label or track names; “Success” dialog now resizable.
• New Equalization preset “Inverse RIAA”, with new button to invert other curves.
• Timer Record now remembers last scheduled duration.
• Meter Toolbar can now be made much narrower, and so more suitable for vertical orientation.
• New Preferences choice for “System” language which is used on first run instead of asking user to choose language.
• Warning now provided if WAV/AIFF exports are not successfully completed.
• (Linux) Improved icon set in compliance with freedesktop.org Icon Theme Specification 0.6.

Bug Fixes

Imports and Exports:

• AAC files could not be exported at 48000 Hz.
• When importing multiple native file formats using FFmpeg, all files after the first reverted to using the native importer.
• FFmpeg custom export window too large on 800 x 600 resolution monitors.
• Projects froze if files imported via On-Demand were no longer available.
• (Linux) WAV/AIFF exports were corrupted if overwriting an aliased file which had been imported using the command line.

Labels:

• Cutting or deleting a region in the waveform and label track did not move the labels in advance of the cut.
• Incorrect behavior snapping to labels and boundaries with Snap To enabled.
• Labels can now be reversed if included with the audio selection using the command line.

Other bug fixes:

• When using non-English languages, Generate effects truncated the selected region.
• Mice with high-precision scroll-wheels could cause a crash.
• Changing recording preferences using the Transport menu did not update the menu in other open projects.
• (Windows 7) Clicking in a file open or save dialog caused files or folders to disappear from the list, and file filtering was broken.

Audacity is a free wave (audio) editor.

Visit: Audacity

Getting started with Audacity 1.3 :

Using the Audacity software as the starting off point, we discuss what the software is, what it can do, how you can use it, and where you go to get started installing it. All of this information is grounded in some basic audio editing terminology and background for those that aren’t so technology inclined.

Then we’ll start digging into a sample project! You’ll learn about how to set up a project, create a voice track, record an interview with Skype, and basic audio editing techniques. All of this done in an easy to follow, task based approach with lots of examples. Here, we plan to go a step further, we teach how to wrap all of these steps together and create a podcast that can be posted on your own website or blog.

There’s always more you can do with Audacity! The last portion of the book is dedicated to just that – discussing more advanced editing and mixing techniques, using affects, adding music, adding additional plug-ins to the software. All still incorporating examples and easy to follow tasks you can try on your own audio projects.

Price: 35.99

Visit: Packt Publishing