Export Module

Export presets and print files

The Export wizard can save its setup to disk and read it back, so a delivery spec built on one machine, or for one client, is reusable anywhere. Everything lives in one toolbar menu, Presets and prints, whose tooltip states the split: Import or export the whole export configuration, or just the selected prints. The menu writes two different kinds of file. A preset file carries the whole export configuration; a prints file carries only the prints you selected.

The Presets and prints menu

The menu has two groups:

• Export Configuration: Import Preset… and Export Preset….
• Prints: Import Prints…, always available, and Export Selected Print(s)…, which needs at least one selected print and is disabled otherwise.

Selection works as in the rest of the list: click a checkbox to toggle one print, shift-click to paint a span, or use Select all in the toolbar. Whatever is checked when you choose Export Selected Print(s)… is what goes into the file.

Export presets: the whole configuration

Export Preset… writes the current export configuration to a preset file; Import Preset… reads one back. A preset carries the project values from the Print settings page together with the session’s custom prints:

• Naming: base filename, suffix and casing.
• Method: the bounce method (Online, Offline or Automatic).
• Mix source: the project mix source.
• Audio formats: the format list.
• Delivery: Add prints to session and its Position.
• Destination: the Save In folder.
• Custom prints: the prints in the Custom Prints section at the moment you export.

Favorite prints do not travel in a preset. They belong to your library, not to the configuration, so a preset written on a machine with twenty favorites carries none of them. To move favorites, export them as a prints file (below) and star them again after import.

Two things can stop an import. If you pick a prints file by mistake, fMusic refuses it with a pointer to the right command: That’s a prints file, not an export preset — use "Import Prints…" instead. Any other problem with the file is reported in an alert titled Couldn’t use that preset, with the reason beneath it.

Prints files: selected prints only

A prints file is the portable form of one or more prints, independent of the rest of the configuration. Export Selected Print(s)… writes the checked prints to a versioned file; Import Prints… reads a prints file into the current session. The file describes each print by content, not by identity:

Because tracks travel by name, an imported print re-attaches to the tracks of the session you import into: names that exist are picked up, names that do not are reported (see the summary below). Mix sources and categories are matched the same way. Imported prints arrive already selected, like newly created ones, and land in the Custom Prints section: star the ones you want to keep across sessions. As custom prints, they are also subject to the custom print limit on Intro (see Favorite and custom prints).

Import errors

A prints file is refused, and nothing is imported, in three cases:

• The file was written by a newer fMusic: This prints file was saved by a newer version of fMusic (format X; this build reads up to Y). Update fMusic to import it. The file is fine; this build simply cannot read that format version.
• The file is not a prints file at all: That file isn’t a prints file fMusic can read.
• The file holds no prints: That prints file is empty — there is nothing to import.

The Prints imported summary

When an import goes through, an alert titled Prints imported reports what happened, starting with the count (N prints imported.) and followed by one line per adjustment fMusic had to make:

• Renamed to avoid a clash: "A" → "A 2". A print with the same name already existed, so the newcomer was renamed.
• Imported without some tracks: "X" (2 missing). The print was imported, but some of its track names are not in this session; it will bounce without them until you edit it.
• Mix source not in this session: "X" → @DRUM BUSS. The print asks for a mix source this session does not have. Check the print’s Mix source before bouncing: a print with its own source is never repointed at another mix, it is skipped at run time instead.
• Skipped, none of their tracks are in this session: "X". No track of the print exists here, so it was not imported at all.

Every print that did make it in is now an ordinary custom print: open it with Edit Print to add tracks, fix its source or change its range, exactly as described in Print parameters. Whether an imported print inherits its mix source and formats or carries its own is visible in the list, as for any print (see Inherit vs override).

Which file for which job