Audacity

On Thu, 20 Nov 2008 14:42:45 -0600
Lee <mek985@...> wrote:
> This is a problem I've had through many versions of Audacity and I  
> finally decided to join the list and ask about it. I'm currently using  
> Audacity 1.3.6 and Mac OS X 10.5.5 Leopard.
> 
> If I choose "Noise Removal..." from the Noise Removal submenu of the  
> Utility submenu of the Effects menu with a few seconds of audio  
> selected in a stereo Audacity project, then click the "Get Noise  
> Profile" button, the Noise Removal window closes the same way it  
> closes if I click the Cancel button. Not having ever successfully used  
> the feature, I have always considered that this might be the expected  
> behavior, so that after the action analyzes the selected audio, I  
> might be able to open the window by choosing the menu item again, then  
> adjust the noise removal settings and click OK. But when I choose the  
> menu item again, I'm greeted with precisely the same window, and the  
> OK button remains dim as it was before I had clicked the Get Noise  
> Profile button, so I must assume that either the feature needs some  
> special action that I'm not aware of, or that it simply doesn't work  
> in the Mac version.

Welcome to the list.

The Noise Removal dialogue does indeed close after you click 
"Get Noise Profile", and when you call Noise Removal again 
from the menu, the OK button should be available. The fact that 
it isn't indicates the Noise Profile was not captured, or more likely,
can't be read from memory.      

This is very occasionally reported, but only on Mac, and we don't 
really understand why it happens. It is usually reported on PPC 
Macs (like G4's). What Mac architecture are you on? And if you 
hit ENTER rather than click when you try to grab the profile, does
it change anything?

One (rather restrictive) thing you could try is to run Audacity in
"CleanSpeech" Mode. This is a reduced interface with fewer and
shorter menus, but in this mode, the Noise Profile is captured to 
a file. The actual file is at:
~/Library/Application Support/audacity/NRP/noisegate.nrp 

You can turn CleanSpeech on at Audacity > Preferences: Interface 
tab by putting a check in "CleanSpeech Mode" in the "Modes" section
bottom left. Please let us know if that enables you to use the Noise 
Removal.  

Note: the Noise Removal dialogue has more text in this mode but it's
the same tool. Note also there have been scattered reports of crashes 
on Mac when noisegate.nrp exists, so it would be helpful to know what
happens in your case. 


Thanks



Gale

On Nov 20, 2008, at 8:19 PM, gale@... wrote:

> Welcome to the list.
>
> The Noise Removal dialogue does indeed close after you click
> "Get Noise Profile", and when you call Noise Removal again
> from the menu, the OK button should be available. The fact that
> it isn't indicates the Noise Profile was not captured, or more likely,
> can't be read from memory.
>
> This is very occasionally reported, but only on Mac, and we don't
> really understand why it happens. It is usually reported on PPC
> Macs (like G4's). What Mac architecture are you on? And if you
> hit ENTER rather than click when you try to grab the profile, does
> it change anything?
>
> One (rather restrictive) thing you could try is to run Audacity in
> "CleanSpeech" Mode. This is a reduced interface with fewer and
> shorter menus, but in this mode, the Noise Profile is captured to
> a file. The actual file is at:
> ~/Library/Application Support/audacity/NRP/noisegate.nrp
>
> You can turn CleanSpeech on at Audacity > Preferences: Interface
> tab by putting a check in "CleanSpeech Mode" in the "Modes" section
> bottom left. Please let us know if that enables you to use the Noise
> Removal.
>
> Note: the Noise Removal dialogue has more text in this mode but it's
> the same tool. Note also there have been scattered reports of crashes
> on Mac when noisegate.nrp exists, so it would be helpful to know what
> happens in your case.
>
>
> Thanks


Thank you very much for responding. First of all I tried everything  
you mentioned including CleanSpeech and removing the Audacity  
preferences. Nothing made a difference. Nothing gets saved in ~/ 
Library/Application Support/audacity/NRP/ when in CleanSpeech mode  
(the folder is there, but it's empty. I find it interesting that you  
mentioned hitting ENTER, because there is no default button in my  
Noise Removal window, so pressing enter or return has no effect. I'm  
using a 32 bit MacBook Pro (core duo not core 2 duo) 2.16 mHz, but  
I've use Audacity on other models and in other architectures with  
precisely the same results for Noise Removal. That is the most  
perplexing characteristic of this problem for me. I've never been able  
to use this feature as far as I can remember, I've just never gone to  
the trouble of trying to figure it out before. I'm beginning to wonder  
what characteristics might be common to the files I'm trying to edit  
that might result in this type of problem. They're just the default  
files captured during recording with Audacity. Thanks again.

Lee

On Nov 20, 2008, at 8:19 PM, gale@... wrote


> The Noise Removal dialogue does indeed close after you click
> "Get Noise Profile", and when you call Noise Removal again
> from the menu, the OK button should be available. The fact that
> it isn't indicates the Noise Profile was not captured, or more likely,
> can't be read from memory.
>
> This is very occasionally reported, but only on Mac, and we don't
> really understand why it happens. It is usually reported on PPC
> Macs (like G4's). What Mac architecture are you on? And if you
> hit ENTER rather than click when you try to grab the profile, does
> it change anything?
>
> One (rather restrictive) thing you could try is to run Audacity in
> "CleanSpeech" Mode. This is a reduced interface with fewer and
> shorter menus, but in this mode, the Noise Profile is captured to
> a file. The actual file is at:
> ~/Library/Application Support/audacity/NRP/noisegate.nrp

This did not fix the problem for me, but deleting the entire contents  
of  ~/Library/Application Support/audacity between Audacity sessions  
did.
>
I discovered this by trying Portable Audacity. When I chose to import  
preferences, the problem persisted, but when I chose not to import  
preferences, the problem disappeared. I'm still not sure which file or  
files in ~/Library/Application Support/audacity were causing the  
problem, but it appears to be fixed now. I hope this helps other Mac  
users who encounter the problem. Thanks.

Lee

Lee-2 wrote:
> 
> On Nov 20, 2008, at 8:19 PM, gale@... wrote
>> The Noise Removal dialogue does indeed close after you click
>> "Get Noise Profile", and when you call Noise Removal again
>> from the menu, the OK button should be available. The fact that
>> it isn't indicates the Noise Profile was not captured, or more likely,
>> can't be read from memory.
>>
>> This is very occasionally reported, but only on Mac, and we don't
>> really understand why it happens. It is usually reported on PPC
>> Macs (like G4's)... 
>>
>> One (rather restrictive) thing you could try is to run Audacity in
>> "CleanSpeech" Mode. This is a reduced interface with fewer and
>> shorter menus, but in this mode, the Noise Profile is captured to
>> a file. The actual file is at:
>> ~/Library/Application Support/audacity/NRP/noisegate.nrp
> 
> This did not fix the problem for me, but deleting the entire contents  
> of  ~/Library/Application Support/audacity between Audacity sessions  
> did.
> 
> I discovered this by trying Portable Audacity. When I chose to import  
> preferences, the problem persisted, but when I chose not to import  
> preferences, the problem disappeared. I'm still not sure which file or  
> files in ~/Library/Application Support/audacity were causing the  
> problem, but it appears to be fixed now. I hope this helps other Mac  
> users who encounter the problem. 

Thanks for telling us that. Still, it does not make a lot of sense because 
your Preferences would also be new when you first ran Audacity Beta, and 
there is nothing in:

~/Library/Application Support/audacity

that relates to Noise Removal except that NRP folder - and that should
not exist until you use CleanSpeech mode (but it should contain the 
Noise Profile as noisegate.nrp once you grab a noise profile while in that 
mode). I wonder if once you get the problem with Noise Removal not 
being captured in normal mode, you have to enter Clean Speech mode
and then get out of if before grabbing the noise profile will work 
properly? 

By the way we applied a "fix" to "Portable Audacity":
http://audacityteam.org/wiki/index.php?title=Portable_Audacity

a couple of weeks ago (which will be in the next 1.3.7 Beta soon) 
because it was tending to use the audacity.cfg settings file in
~/Library/Application Support/audacity rather than the "Portable 
Settings" folder in the same folder as Audacity.app. 
 

Gale 


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